All the games were selected for them by supervisors and had to have some useful, educational purpose. The children learned these new games but unlearned something else in the process: they forgot to be happy, how to take pleasure in little things and last, but not least, how to dream

— Michael Ende

Areas was fighting not for himself, but for his friend, whom he was trying to save by defeating him.

— Michael Ende

Even when I was caught on the web, I didn't give up hope. And as you see, I was right.

— Michael Ende

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. Furthermore, he never stopped believing in mysteries and miracles.

— Michael Ende

Her feelings of fear and helplessness had reached such a pitch that they were suddenly transformed into their opposites. Having overcome them, she felt courageous and self-confident enough to tackle any power on earth; more precisely, she had ceased to worry about herself.

— Michael Ende

He's a good old sort. If only he weren't plumb crazy!

— Michael Ende

He was handsome and strong, but somehow that wasn't enough for him. He also felt the need to be tough and inured to hardship... But how was he to come by that quality in this luminous garden, where all manner of fruit was to be had for the picking?

— Michael Ende

In his opinion, all the world’s misfortunes stemmed from the countless untruths, both deliberate and unintentional, which people told because of haste or carelessness.

— Michael Ende

It's asking us our names," Factor reported." I'm Areas!" Areas cried." I'm Factor!" cried Factor. The boy without a name was silent. Atreyu looked at him, then took him by the hand and cried: "He's Bastian Balthazar BUX!"" It asks," Factor translated, "why he doesn't speak for himself."" He can't," said Areas. "He has forgotten everything." Falkor listened again to the roaring of the fountain." Without memory, it says, he cannot come in. The snakes won't let him through." Atreyu replied: "I have stored up everything he told us about himself and his world. I vouch for him." Falkor listened." It wants to know by what right?"" I am his friend," said Areas.

— Michael Ende

...it's like this. Sometimes, when you have a very long street ahead of you, you think how terribly long it is and feel sure you'll never get it swept. And then you start to hurry. You work faster and faster and every time you look up there seems to be just as much left to sweep as before, and you try even harder, and you panic, and in the end you're out of breath and have to stop--and still the street stretches away in front of you. That's not the way to do it. You must never think of the whole street at once, understand? You must only concentrate on the next step, the next breath, the next stroke of the broom, and the next, and the next. Nothing else. That way you enjoy your work, which is important, because then you make a good job of it. And that's how it ought to be. And all at once, before you know it, you find you've swept the whole street clean, bit by bit. What's more, you aren't out of breath. That's important, too... (28-29)

— Michael Ende