"If you're going to have a complicated..." - Quote by J R R Tolkien
If you're going to have a complicated story you must work to a map; otherwise you'll never make a map of it afterwards.
More by J R R Tolkien
“I have an unsatisfied desire to shoot well with a bow.”
“Nay! Alas for us all! And for all that walk in the world in these after-days. For such is the way of it: to find and lose, as it seems to those whose boat is on the running stream. But I count you blessed [...] for your loss you suffer of your own free will, and you might have chosen otherwise. But you have not forsaken your companions, and the least reward that you shall have is that the memory of Lothlórien shall remain ever clear and unstained in your heart, and shall neither fade nor grow stale.”
“And now leave me in peace for a bit! I don't want to answer a string of questions while I am eating. I want to think!" "Good Heavens!" said Pippin. "At breakfast?”
More on Storytelling
“The romantics would call this a love story, the cynics would call it a tragedy.”
“When I see a story, I ask: is this something I'd like to be in? Is this something I'd like to see? And if I'd like to see it, would I like to tell it?”
“A science fiction story is just an attempt to solve a problem that exists in the world, sometimes a moral problem, sometimes a physical or social or theological problem.”
More on Planning
“Take time to deliberate, but when the time for action has arrived, stop thinking and go in.”
“I think about things to put them in a place where I don't have to think about them anymore. Say if I had a child with a really bad mom, I would have to think more than if I had a child with a good mom. I'm just doing my homework early.”
“A plan is always successful if the plan is good.”