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Myth Quotes

Where legend and history blur, and where clear thinking cuts through.

This collection looks at myth from several angles — the pull of legend in storytelling, family histories that fade into folklore, and the way popular retellings of the past can drift from what actually happened. It's a page about separating fact from long-told tales.

Uncritical semantics is the myth of a museum in which the exhibits are meanings and the words are labels. To switch languages is to change the labels.

Quotes by Willard Van Orman Quine

I wanted to connect a modern story with a myth that I had read.

Quotes by Wally Lamb

There's a myth that Roosevelt gave Stalin Eastern Europe. I was with Roosevelt every day at Yalta.

Quotes by W. Averell Harriman

In our family, as far as we are concerned, we were born and what happened before that is myth.

Quotes by V. S. Pritchett

American Quotes

It is a leftist myth that European conquerors and settlers encountered only peaceful, virtuous tribes and subdued them murderously in the name of Christianity and Capitalism.

Quotes by Tom Tancredo

For the myth is the foundation of life; it is the timeless schema, the pious formula into which life flows when it reproduces its traits out of the unconscious.

Thomas Mann

I grew up under Thatcher. I grew up believing that I was fundamentally powerless. Then gradually over the years it occurred to me that this was actually a very convenient myth for the state.

Quotes by Thom Yorke

Something fundamental about the myth of the Jew has resurfaced.

Quotes by Steven T. Katz

It's a bit of a myth that too much cholesterol causes heart attacks.

Quotes by Steven Gundry

Beautiful Quotes

I think one of the biggest myths is that education cannot flourish with regulation. Another myth is that wherever the state sponsors education, it doesn't flourish.

Quotes by Smriti Irani

Myth is neither a lie nor a confession: it is an inflexion.

Quotes by Roland Barthes

I think the rock'n'roll myth of living on the edge is a pile of crap.

Quotes by Robert Smith

American public policy is run on a myth.

Quotes by Richard Lamm

The Orpheus myth is my favorite myth, and the prodigal son is my favorite parable.

Quotes by Peter Hedges

Education Quotes

The sentient beast has long been a staple of fantasy fiction and its antecedents in myth and folktale.

Quotes by Paul Di Filippo

To me, superhero movies are like Greek myth.

Quotes by Patty Jenkins

Mexico was conquered more by manipulation of myth and archetype.

Quotes by Norman Spinrad

It's the historian's job not to ridicule the myths, but to show the difference between myth and reality.

Quotes by Norman Davies

Plato wove historical fact into literary myth.

Quotes by Michael Shermer

Fantasy Quotes

I began to pick apart our knowledge of Frankenstein and discovered that the public's idea of this myth comes from a million different places... I became committed to recontextualizing it all so it all worked in one story.

Quotes by Max Landis

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the general theme of these myth quotes?
They explore the space between legend and fact, including how creative work borrows from myth and how popular retellings of history can drift from what actually happened.
Is there a quote about historical myths specifically?
Yes, one speaker who was personally present at a major historical meeting pushes back on a widely repeated claim about who was responsible for a postwar decision, without naming the leaders involved here.
Do any quotes treat myth as something personal rather than historical?
Yes, one reflects on how a family's own origin story becomes myth once it predates living memory.
Is there a quote about language and meaning?
Yes, one compares uncritical use of words to a museum where meanings are treated as fixed exhibits rather than living ideas.
What other pages relate to storytelling and legend?
See our Fantasy Quotes and Education Quotes pages for related themes.

One quote even compares language itself to a museum of borrowed meanings. Continue with more reflective reading on our Education Quotes and Fantasy Quotes pages.