“He had never been willing to believe that life had to be as gray and dull as people claimed. He heard them saying: “Life is like that,” but he couldn’t agree. He never stopped believing in mysteries and miracles.”
MICHAEL ENDE is one of the most genius and talented writers that has ever, or will ever be. He is perhaps best known for his book "The Neverending Story" - which most people seem to have seen as a film (which he, by the way, despised - railing against it - and describing it as "revolting". He also explained that "The makers of the film simply did not understand the book at all. They just wanted to make money." and he asked that his name be removed from the credits or any association to it). Initially, Michael Ende had been okay with the idea of a film being made, and had even worked as an advisor on the script. He said that he "trusted them" and expected to create a beautiful movie. He later revealed that they had secretly re-written the screenplay - which he only found out about five days before the premiere. He felt that his "moral and artistic existence was at stake" in that film - and he brought suit against the film's production company for breach of contract - also attempting to stop the sequels. One would think that the author of the story itself should have a say in these matters - though most are exposed to an entirely different version of the situation.
Anyone who reads the book will understand why it far exceeds anything put to film anyhow, and will experience a world that will remain with you forever, transforming and changing your whole perception of existence itself. There is perhaps no greater book for stimulating the imagination, and developing the powers of accessing other dimensions through reading - than "The Neverending Story". If you struggle with writers/creators block, it will also help.
A direct quote from Jeremy Garner's book "The Divine Union" on "The Neverending Story": "It is a magical book that opens many doorways within one’s own soul, and it often seems to be speaking directly to the reader – in two senses.
What makes it particularly clever in writing style is that the author has separated it into the events which take place in “Fantastica” and the events which take place in the “real world”. What this effectively does, is that while you are reading the events which take place in “Bastian’s reality”, you are of course still “imagining” this, even though you feel that you have returned to “reality” – because it is still part of the story you are reading – but when the “reader” you are “reading” about begins to then “read” The Neverending Story – you then join this reader, and you go even deeper into the story, a whole level deeper, – thus entering with him into the Land of Fantastica.
This means that by the time you actually reach Fantastica, you are already two levels inside of the book – you have passed the surface level, which explains the life of Bastian, “the reader” – and you have then entered the second level, of sharing in the adventures of Fantastica – and so, Fantastica becomes extremely vivid to you, because your imagination has already been well-trained through reading about (and with) the “reader” of the book.
It also means, that when the book is interspersed with thoughts from the one reading the same book that you are – those moments, feel as though you have now come back to reality – but you are effectively, still using your imagination – for you have only retracted to the first level of imagination at this point – and it is not until you actually close the book completely, that you again notice your surroundings and realize just how deeply you had entered into Fantastica.
It is almost like a form of hypnotism, and there is no other book quite like it.
It is like reading “a dream within a dream” – and it is written in one of the most effective writing styles – as it actively engages the imagination to its highest potential – and ultimately, begins to flow into your everyday reality, so that the book actually begins to synchronize with your own life, and you realize that just as the “reader” in the book discovers that he has a part to play in Fantastica – and that he can even shape the events in the book with his own will – you too, as the reader, of the reader of the book, soon discover that you also have a part to play in shaping the world of Fantastica."
Jeremy Garner released an audiobook version of "The Neverending Story" in 2020, to help the story live on in the imaginations and hearts of future readers and travelers to Fantastica. This contains sound effects, voices, characters, and other such things throughout - to create an immersive and otherworldly experience. It was created for the purpose of being able to visit this land in a type of meditation or trance-state, without having to keep your eyes on the book.
Another of Michael Ende's stories which is entirely life-changing and revolutionary, is known as "MOMO". This book was published in 1973, before "The Neverending Story" and it is on the subject of "time", and the ways in which our time and lives are being robbed from us by these "time thieves" - through a variety of illusions causing us to assume that we must work more, faster, and harder in order to save as much money or "time" as possible, yet all the while losing our lives, our imaginations, and the divinity of the world around us - which gradually becomes devoid of all beauty through the onset of trying to save more time.
This is a wonderfully enlightening and beautiful novel which will change your perspective on the things which matter most in this life. It is a transformative book which would truly free any individual who read it from the lies of this world. Perhaps the very reason why the name "MOMO" had to become a "viral sensation" in 2018 of a dark figure who would give children various tasks to harm themselves, commit suicide or terrorize them - so as to associate the very thing which would free children from terror, lies, and death - with those very concerns.
"Time is life itself, and life resides in the human heart.
The men in gray knew this better than anyone. Nobody knew the value of an hour or a minute, or even of a single second, as well as they. They were experts on time just as leeches are experts on blood, and they acted accordingly.
They had designs on people's time - long-term and well-laid plans of their own. What mattered most to them was that no one should become aware of their activities. They had surreptitiously installed themselves in the city. Now, step by step and day by day, they were secretly invading its inhabitants' lives and taking them over.
They knew the identity of every person likely to further their plans long before that person had any inkling of it. They waited for the ideal moment to entrap him, and they saw to it that the ideal moment came." - Momo, Michael Ende
