Hi, Gavin.

Thank you for your comment regarding the quote in the most recent “5-Bullet Friday” newsletter. Tim was aware of the G.K. Chesterton quote at time of writing and so referred to Neil Gaiman’s words to help him make his decision about attribution (N.G.’s original post on the topic can be found at https://neil-gaiman.tumblr.com/post/42909304300/my-moms-a-librarian-and-planning-to-put-literary): “It’s my fault. When I started writing Coraline, I wrote my version of the quote in Tremendous Trifles, meaning to go back later and find the actual quote, as I didn’t own the book, and this was before the Internet. And then ten years went by before I finished the book, and in the meantime I had completely forgotten that the Chesterton quote was mine and not his.

“I’m perfectly happy for anyone to attribute it to either of us. The sentiment is his, the phrasing is mine.”

Thank you again for your writing in and for the opportunity to credit the original inspiration. That and other wonderful G. K. Chesterton quotes can be found at https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/G._K._Chesterton.

Team Tim Ferriss

“Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.”
​— From Coraline by Neil Gaiman

Is actually a paraphrase of G.K. Chesterton From The Red Angel by published in Tremendous Trifles, 1909.

I’m taken the time to point it out because Chesterton is a phenomenal author worth checking out. Not the easiest read (for me anyway) because of the historical distance, but a heavy weight of old. One of CS Lewis’ fav authors.

Appreciate your work. Thank you and keep it coming. Cheers.