Quotes about fairy tales (29 quotes) | Quotes of famous people

“I was obsessed with fairytales, and I was a very, very inquisitive kid, and I would ask my mom all kinds of questions. It all kind of formed a story in my head, and I really wanted to be a published author when I was 10, but I had a hard time writing a novel when I was 10, so I decided to wait until I was little bit older and then get it done.”

Chris Colfer (1990) actor, singer, book author

-Chris Colfer on how he came up with the idea of TLOS
Interview Quotes, Random Quotes

Moms , Idea , Question , Time

“I'm in love with a fairytale, even though it hurts. 'Cause I don`t care if I lose my mind; Im already cursed.”

Alexander Rybak (1986) Norwegian singer, actor, violinist, composer, pianist

"Fairytale" (2009).

Love , Hurt

“The boat dipped and swayed and sometimes took on water, but it did not sink; the two brothers had waterproofed it well. I do not know where it finally fetched up, if it ever did; perhaps it reached the sea and sails there forever like a magic boat in a fairytale. All I know is that it was still afloat and still running on the breast of the flood when it passed the incorporated town limits of Derry, Maine, and there it passes out of this tale forever.”

Stephen King book It

It (1986)

Water , Sea

“I'm not a princess,
This ain't a fairytale.
I'm not the one you'll sweep off her feet,
Lead her up the stairwell.
This ain't Hollywood,
This is a small town.
I was a dreamer before
You went and let me down.
Now it's too late for you and your white horse
To come around.”

Taylor Swift (1989) American singer-songwriter

White Horse, written by Taylor Swift and Liz Rose.
Song lyrics, Fearless (2008)

Horse , Princess

“Well she's walking through the clouds
With a circus mind, that's running round.
Butterflies and Zebras, and moonbeams, and fairytales-
That's all she ever thinks about. Riding with the wind.”

Jimi Hendrix (1942–1970) American musician, singer and songwriter

Little Wing
Song lyrics, Axis: Bold as Love (1967)

Thinking

“People are dying. Entire ecosystems are collapsing. We are in the beginning of a mass extinction. And all you can talk about is money and fairytales of eternal economic growth. How dare you!”

Greta Thunberg (2003) Swedish climate change activist

If world leaders choose to fail us, my generation will never forgive them https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/sep/23/world-leaders-generation-climate-breakdown-greta-thunberg (23 September 2019), from speech delivered at the UN Climate Action Summit.
2019

Money , People

“His story is one of those stories to be told, one of those fairytales - just like it happened to me - to be narrated to your children and grandchildren.”

Steven Gerrard (1980) English footballer

Paolo Maldini, AC Milan Legend ( Source http://www.liverpoolfc.com/news/first-team/185608-maldini-steven-is-similar-to-baresi)

Children

“Happiness is like those palaces in fairytales whose gates are guarded by dragons: We must fight in order to conquer it.”

Alexandre Dumas (1802–1870) French writer and dramatist, father of the homonym writer and dramatist

Fight , Happiness

“In his eyes I saw all the other possibilities. The dream-world possibilities. The fairytale possibilities. The seemingly impossible possibilities.”

Tiffanie DeBartolo (1970) American writer

Source: How to Kill a Rock Star

World , Dreams

“Women want the fairytale. Not all women, of course, but most women grow up dreaming about the kind of man who would risk everything for them, even knowing they might get hurt.”

Nicholas Sparks book True Believer

Source: True Believer

Women , Dreams , Hurt

“The vengeful God of wrath and punishment
is a mere fairytale. It simply is the Me
That makes me fail.”

Angelus Silesius (1624–1677) German writer

The Cherubinic Wanderer

God

“My response to Bernie Sanders' you know uh stories you know fairytales is that uh the failure of capitalism is still much better than the success of socialism.”

Garry Kasparov (1963) former chess world champion

2010s, Interview with Bill Kristol (2016)

Failure , Success

“What had originally been a straightforward battle of ideas between anarchy and fascism had been turned into a kind of ham-fisted parable of 9-11 and the war against terror, in which the words anarchy and fascism appear nowhere. … It struck me that for Hollywood to make V for Vendetta, it was a way for thwarted and impotent American liberals to feel that they were making some kind of statement about how pissed off they were with the current situation without really risking anything. It’s all set in England, which I think that probably, in most American eyes, is kind of a fairytale kingdom where we still perhaps still have giants. It doesn’t really exist; it might as well be in the Land of Oz for most Americans. So you can get set your political parable in this fantasy environment called England, and then you can vent your spleen against George Bush and the neo-conservatives. Those were my feelings, and I must admit those are completely based upon not having seen the film even once, but having read a certain amount of the screenplay. That was enough.”

Alan Moore (1953) English writer primarily known for his work in comic books

On the film adaptation of V for Vendetta
Alan Moore on Anarchism (2009)

War , Way , Feeling , Idea

“I suspect it is this Camelot view that leads Miss Croce to be rather unfair to Gene Kelly…I should say the difference starts with their bodies. If you compare Kelly to Astaire, accepting Astaire's debonair style as perfection then, of course, Kelly looks bad. But in popular dance forms, in which movement is not rigidly codified, as it is in ballet, perfection is a romantic myth or a figure of speech, nothing more. Kelly isn't a winged dancer; he's a hoofer and more earthbound. But he has warmth and range as an actor…Astaire's grasshopper lightness was his limitation as an actor - confining him to perennial gosh-oh-gee adolescence;; he was always and only a light comedian and could function only in fairytale vehicles.”

Fred Astaire (1899–1987) American dancer, singer, actor, choreographer and television presenter

Pauline Kael, responding to Croce in her review of Croce's The Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers Book, writing in The New Yorker, November 25, 1972, as reproduced in Kael, Pauline. Reeling: Film Writings 1972-1975, Marion Boyars, London - New York, pp. 58-59. ISBN 0-7145-2582-0.

Light , Dance , Perfection

“I want to cover all areas that can be depicted visually. This ranges from fairytales to attempts to enter the abstract and view oneself as a social outcast or someone struggling to stay alive.”

Günter Brus (1938) Austrian artist

Source: Nervous Stillness on the Horizon (2006), P. 218 (1987)

“My voice in combination with the harp - which, by the way, I use because I've played it my entire life, not to make some statement about the harp - somehow has … coloured people's interpretations of the music and projected an idea of childlike or fairytale quality or innocence. Which sometimes prevents people from listening to the songs the way I would like them to be listened to.”

Joanna Newsom (1982) American musician

Sydney Morning Herald, 10 October 2005

Life , People , Music , Way

“Doctor Who has never pretended to be hard science fiction … At best Doctor Who is a fairytale, with fairytale logic about this wonderful man in this big blue box who at the beginning of every story lands somewhere where there is a problem.”

Neil Gaiman (1960) English fantasy writer

As quoted in "Neil Gaiman reveals power of writing Doctor Who" by Tim Masters at BBC News (24 May 2010)

Problem , Science , Box

“Let us remember that this scene [the Nativity] represents so much more than just a touching story or a nostalgic holiday fairytale. It is, in fact, a reminder of the most amazing reality: That God came, and God spoke. Peace on earth, God is with us. And the God who spoke still speaks. And the God who came still comes. This is the true Miracle of Christmas – that as we stand here tonight in our real world with our real lives full of problems and questions, past hurts and future hopes, God is with us.”

Steven Curtis Chapman (1962) American Christian music singer-songwriter, record producer, actor, author, and social activist

Playing Pastor Michael Curtis in the Lifetime movie "Christmas Child," 2003 http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0346750/

God , World , Peace , Hope

“It's a fairytale so tragic,
There's no prince to break the spell.
I don't believe in magic,
But for you I will, for you I will.
If I'm a fool, I'll be a fool.
Darlin' for you.”

Bruce Springsteen (1949) American singer and songwriter

"Countin' on a Miracle"
Song lyrics, The Rising (2002)

Fools

“We are at the very bottom, at the dark foundations—we are with the Mothers. Here are endless infernos, those hopeless Ossianic expanses, those lamentable Nibelungs. Here are the great incubators of stories, storyteller factories, misty kilns of fables and fairytales.”

Bruno Schulz (1892–1942) Polish novelist and painter

“Spring” http://www.schulzian.net/translation/sanatorium/spring01.htm
His father, Creativity

“Copernicus published his manuscript in 1543 just in time for the council of Trent. So you're a church father and what this new system of Copernicus is saying is this: The Earth moves, although the Bible says it doesn't. It's no longer at the center of God's universe, although the Bible says it is. It's a planet, so heaven and Earth are no longer separate. And Aristotle was wrong, although church authority depends on him being right. You're a church father and you pick up this subversive, heretical, revolutionary piece of lunacy and you start foaming at the mouth, right? Wrong. When the council finally got around to reading Copernicus they were delighted. His new system had made calendar reform more precise. And the business of it turning every basic belief about the universe on its head? A mere fairytale since from the church's viewpoint he was talking nonsense. Astronomy drew lines and circles in the sky but they weren't really there, they're a mathematical convenience for measuring or teaching astronomy. While the Copernicus system might well have been brilliant mathematics, no one thought for a minute that he was actually suggesting the earth was whizzing around the sun. That kind of talk would blow holes in everything.”

James Burke (science historian) (1936) British broadcaster, science historian, author, and television producer

The Day the Universe Changed (1985)

God , Mathematics , Business , Universe

“I don't care
For your fairytales
You're so worried about the maiden
Oh, you know she's only waiting on the next best thing”

Sara Bareilles (1979) American pop rock singer-songwriter and pianist

"Fairytale"
Lyrics, Careful Confessions (2004)

Waiting

“The story we’re told about sexuality is very similar to the story we’re told about citizenship: Once upon a time, things were very bad and nobody had any fun. Then there were a series of revolutions, and various oppressed groups threw off their chains, and now we are free, the end. If you’re not living happily ever after, it’s your own damn fault. When, and if, anyone ever does get caught flagrantly abusing their power, we write them off as monsters, lone wolves, bad apples, or any other fairytale monster that allows us to continue the bedtime story in which white supremacist capitalist patriarchy is working well for everyone.”

Laurie Penny (1986) English journalist

The Consent of the (Un)governed

Time

“The true fairytales … come straight out of myth; they are, as it were, minuscule reaffirmation of myths, or perhaps the myth made accessible to the local folky mind.”

P. L. Travers (1899–1996) Australian-British novelist, actress and journalist

Source: Myth, Symbol, and Meaning in Mary Poppins (2007), Ch. 2, p. 39
Context: The true fairytales … come straight out of myth; they are, as it were, minuscule reaffirmation of myths, or perhaps the myth made accessible to the local folky mind. One might say that fairytales are the myths falling into time and locality … is the same stuff, all the essentials are there, it is small, but perfect. Not minimized, not to be made digestible for children.

“A fairytale is not an allegory. There may be allegory in it, but it is not an allegory.”

George MacDonald (1824–1905) Scottish journalist, novelist

The Fantastic Imagination (1893)
Context: A fairytale is not an allegory. There may be allegory in it, but it is not an allegory. He must be an artist indeed who can, in any mode, produce a strict allegory that is not a weariness to the spirit.

“A fairytale, like a butterfly or a bee, helps itself on all sides, sips at every wholesome flower, and spoils not one.”

George MacDonald (1824–1905) Scottish journalist, novelist

The Fantastic Imagination (1893)
Context: A fairytale, like a butterfly or a bee, helps itself on all sides, sips at every wholesome flower, and spoils not one. The true fairytale is, to my mind, very like the sonata. We all know that a sonata means something; and where there is the faculty of talking with suitable vagueness, and choosing metaphor sufficiently loose, mind may approach mind, in the interpretation of a sonata, with the result of a more or less contenting consciousness of sympathy. But if two or three men sat down to write each what the sonata meant to him, what approximation to definite idea would be the result? Little enough — and that little more than needful. We should find it had roused related, if not identical, feelings, but probably not one common thought. Has the sonata therefore failed? Had it undertaken to convey, or ought it to be expected to impart anything defined, anything notionally recognizable?
"But words are not music; words at least are meant and fitted to carry a precise meaning!"
It is very seldom indeed that they carry the exact meaning of any user of them! And if they can be so used as to convey definite meaning, it does not follow that they ought never to carry anything else. Words are like things that may be variously employed to various ends. They can convey a scientific fact, or throw a shadow of her child's dream on the heart of a mother. They are things to put together like the pieces of a dissected map, or to arrange like the notes on a stave.

Flowers , Bee , Help

“Were I asked, what is a fairytale? I should reply, Read Undine: that is a fairytale”

George MacDonald (1824–1905) Scottish journalist, novelist

The Fantastic Imagination (1893)
Context: Were I asked, what is a fairytale? I should reply, Read Undine: that is a fairytale; then read this and that as well, and you will see what is a fairytale. Were I further begged to describe the fairytale, or define what it is, I would make answer, that I should as soon think of describing the abstract human face, or stating what must go to constitute a human being. A fairytale is just a fairytale, as a face is just a face; and of all fairytales I know, I think Undine the most beautiful.

Reading

“The true fairytales … come straight out of myth; they are, as it were, minuscule reaffirmation of myths, or perhaps the myth made accessible to the local folky mind. One might say that fairytales are the myths falling into time and locality … is the same stuff, all the essentials are there, it is small, but perfect. Not minimized, not to be made digestible for children.”

P. L. Travers (1899–1996) Australian-British novelist, actress and journalist

Source: Myth, Symbol, and Meaning in Mary Poppins (2007), Ch. 2, p. 39

Perfection , Time , Children

“Suppose my child ask me what the fairytale means, what am I to say?”

George MacDonald (1824–1905) Scottish journalist, novelist

If you do not know what it means, what is easier than to say so? If you do see a meaning in it, there it is for you to give him. A genuine work of art must mean many things; the truer its art, the more things it will mean. If my drawing, on the other hand, is so far from being a work of art that it needs THIS IS A HORSE written under it, what can it matter that neither you nor your child should know what it means? It is there not so much to convey a meaning as to wake a meaning. If it do not even wake an interest, throw it aside. A meaning may be there, but it is not for you. If, again, you do not know a horse when you see it, the name written under it will not serve you much.
The Fantastic Imagination (1893)

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