Reality

"Let us consider Elfland as a great national park, a vast and beautiful place where a person goes by himself, on foot, to get in touch with reality in a special, private, profound fashion. But what happens when it is considered merely as a place to "get away to"?Well, you know what has happened to Yosemite. Everybody comes, not with an ax and a box of matches, but in a trailer with a motorbike on the back and a motorboat on top and a butane stove, five aluminum folding chairs, and a transistor radio on the inside. They arrive totally encapsulated in a secondhand reality. And then they move on to Yellowstone, and it's just the same there, all trailers and transistors. They go from park to park, but they never really go anywhere; except when one of them who thinks that even the wildlife isn't real gets chewed up by a genuine, firsthand bear. The same sort of thing seems to be happening to Elfland, lately."

"There is at least one truth in every myth."

"Why did everyone like that story so much when it wasn't true? Why was everyone so eager to believe it? Was it because, in real life, ever after's generally stink?"

"Happily-ever-after monogamy has been reinforced so steadily in literature that we tend to feel like failures when we don’t achieve that in reality."

"For everything about him fitting her fantasy image of what she wanted, she still didn’t feel seen by him…and that made her all the more aware that maybe her fantasy wasn’t what she wanted at all."

"Leave city, leave reality; enter forest, enter fantasy!"

"The media represents world that is more real than reality that we can experience. People lose the ability to distinguish between reality and fantasy. They also begin to engage with the fantasy without realizing what it really is. They seek happiness and fulfilment through the simulacra of reality, e.g. media and avoid the contact/interaction with the real world."

"No one can destroy the love God has for you. When you abide in truth, you also abide in love. And truth is evidence of love. Nothing can destroy the power of trusting and loving unconditionally."

"I now lived in an invisible place made of my own dwindling breath, and because no one else could see it, they could not yank me out of it."

"Westcliff sees an odd sort of logic in why you would finally be the one to win St. Vincent’s heart. He says a girl like you would appeal to…hmm, how did he put it?…I can’t remember the exact words, but it was something like…you would appeal to St. Vincent’s deepest, most secret fantasy.” Evie felt her cheeks flushing while a skirmish of pain and hope took place in the tired confines of her chest. She tried to respond sardonically. “I should think his fantasy is to consort with as many women as possible.” A grin crossed Lillian’s lips. “Dear, that is not St. Vincent’s fantasy, it’s his reality. And you’re probably the first sweet, decent girl he’s ever had anything to do with.” “He spent quite a lot of time with you and Daisy in Hampshire,” Evie countered. That seemed to amuse Lillian further. “I’m not at all sweet, dear. And neither is my sister. Don’t say you have been laboring under that misconception all this time?"

"Fantasy is a reaction to the constraints of reality."

"I think that's just a story."But, Jace," she said. "All stories are true."

"Sometimes fantasy provides the only reasonable explanation for life's inexplicable moments."

"I don't pay much attention to the distinction between fantasy and science fiction–or between “genre” and “mainstream” for that matter. For me, all fiction is about prizing the logic of metaphors-which is the logic of narratives in general–over reality, which is irreducibly random and senseless. We spend our entire lives trying to tell stories about ourselves–they’re the essence of memory. It is how we make living in this unfeeling accidental universe tolerable. That we call such a tendency “the narrative fallacy” doesn’t mean it doesn’t also touch upon some aspect of the truth. Some stories simply literalize their metaphors a bit more explicitly."

"[Fantasy] is a constructive aspect of the child's experimental exploration of reality, or his progressive relating of himself to reality, of his trial-and-error attempts to solve his reality problems."

"Reality wins, and I'd rather see the truth than stay in love with a fantasy."

"Don't come, I was thinking now. Wherever you are, stay there. Because with her reduced to a fantasy, I could imagine a wonderful meeting. I could see her smiling, tossing her red-haired head, staring at me with inquisitive eyes. I'd say something meaningful to her, and she'd melt for me. Reality could not live up to that."

"All the strangest things are true."

"Suddenly, it seems obvious to me: Only fantasy books can make sense of the skewed reality in which I live."

"Why should I shatter your wonderful fantasy with my boring reality? ~ Evie Snow"