A short story is the ultimate close-up magic trick -- a couple of thousand words to take you around the universe or break your heart.
Neil GaimanRead
There is something about riding a unicorn, for those people who still can, which is unlike any other experience: exhilarating, and intoxicating, and fine.
Interpretation
Riding a unicorn symbolizes a unique, exhilarating experience that is rare and magical.
In this quote, Neil Gaiman captures the essence of extraordinary experiences that can evoke strong emotions and a sense of wonder. Riding a unicorn, often seen as a symbol of imagination and fantasy, reflects the idea that certain rare moments in life can be both liberating and intoxicating, providing a feeling unlike any other.
In practice
Share this quote at a creative writing workshop to inspire imagination.
A short story is the ultimate close-up magic trick -- a couple of thousand words to take you around the universe or break your heart.
Jesus. Low-Key Lyesmith," said Shadow. and then he heard what he was saying and he understood. "Loki," he said. "Loki Lie-smith." "You're slow," said Loki, "but you get there in the end." And his lips twisted into a scarred smile and the embers danced in the shadows of his eyes.
As a teenager I wrote to R.A. Lafferty. And he responded, too, with letters that were like R.A. Lafferty short stories, filled with elliptical answers to straight questions and simple answers to complicated ones.
The important thing to understand about American history, wrote Mr. Ibis, in his leather-bound journal, is that it is fictional, a charcoal-sketched simplicity for the children, or the easily bored.
Nothing’s changed. You’ll go home. You’ll be bored. You’ll be ignored. No one will listen to you, really listen to you. You’re too clever and too quiet for them to understand. They don’t even get your name right.
I like the stars. It's the illusion of permanence, I think. I mean, they're always flaring up and caving in and going out. But from here, I can pretend...I can pretend that things last. I can pretend that lives last longer than moments. Gods come, and gods go. Mortals flicker and flash and fade. Worlds don't last; and stars and galaxies are transient, fleeting things that twinkle like fireflies and vanish into cold and dust. But I can pretend.
Poetry should... should strike the reader as a wording of his own highest thoughts, and appear almost a remembrance.
I don't mind being classified as a jazz artist, but I do mind being restricted to being a jazz artist. My foundation has been in jazz, though I didn't really start out that way. I started in classical music, but my formative years were in jazz, and it makes a great foundation.
The arts have a development which comes not only from the individual but also from a whole acquired force, the civilization which precedes us. One cannot do just anything. A talented artist cannot do whatever he pleases. If he only used his gifts, he would not exist. We are not the masters of what we produce. It is imposed on us.
Anecdotes don't make good stories. Generally I dig down underneath them so far that the story that finally comes out is not what people thought their anecdotes were about.
Photography is an art of observation - it's about creating something extraordinary out of the ordinary. You choose a frame and then wait until the right time for something magical to come along and fill it.
I was born Chinese, and I write in Chinese. I don't think there's any need to evade this... to a writer, as to a person, what matters is not his political label or his nationality, but whether he is a person and whether his work is worth looking at.
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