The Neverending Story

by Michael Ende

Bastian Balthazar Bux’s passion was books.

‘I wonder,’ he said to himself, ‘what’s in a book while it’s closed. Oh, I know it’s full of letters printed on paper, but all the same, something must be happening, because as soon as I open it, there’s a whole story with people I don’t know yet and all kinds of adventures and deeds and battles. And sometimes there are storms at sea, or it takes you to strange cities and countries. All those things are somehow shut up in a book. Of course you have to read it to find out. But it’s already there, that’s the funny thing. I just wish I knew how it could be.’

He now realized that not only was Fantastica sick, but the human world as well. The two were connected. He had always felt this, though he could not have explained why it was so. 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.

‘I … no, really … I don’t understand.’ ‘I can see that by the look on your face,’ she said. ‘But whether you understand or not, you’ve done it. And that’s what counts, isn’t it?’

DO WHAT YOU WISH.” That must mean I can do anything I feel like. Don’t you think so?’ All at once Grograman’s face looked alarmingly grave, and his eyes glowed. ‘No,’ he said in his deep, rumbling voice. ‘It means that you must do what you really and truly want. And nothing is more difficult.’

now he knew that there were thousands and thousands of forms of joy in the world, but that all were essentially one and the same, namely, the joy of being able to love. And much later, long after Bastian had returned to his world, in his maturity and even in his old age, this joy never left him entirely. Even in the hardest moments of his life he preserved a lightheartedness that made him smile and that comforted others.