There are all kinds of stories. Some are born with the telling; their substance is language, and before someone puts them into words they are but a hint of emotion, a caprice of mind, an image or an intangible recollection.

Others are manifest whole, like an apple, and can be repeated infinitely without risk of altering their meaning.

Some are taken from reality and processed through inspiration, while others rise up from an instant of inspiration and become real after being told.

And then there are secret stories that remain hidden in the shadows of the mind; they are like living organisms, they grow roots and tentacles, they become covered with excrescences and parasites, and with time are transformed into the matter of nightmares. To exorcise the demons of memory, it is sometimes necessary to tell them as a story.

Isabelle Allende, "The Stories of Eva Luna", 1989

The world is a tragedy to those who feel, but a comedy to those who think.
Horace Walpole (1717 - 1797)

I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours.
Jerome K. Jerome (1859 - 1927), "Three Men in a Boat", 1889