"There are tales that are told many times.

Some tales you tell children, stories that tell them the history of the tribe, what is good to eat, what is not. Cautionary tales.
There are the tales the women tell, in the private tongue men children are never taught and older men are too wise to learn, and these tales are not told to men.
There are the tales the men tell each other, in the men's hut at night, crude raucous tales of the lizard who lost his male member, or of the Malabayo, the trickster, who sold ape dung to King Lion, telling him it was the soul of the moon.
There are the tales the whole tribe tell each other, at festivals, at feasts: the story of the rock that jumped, of how fire came, a thousand others.
Low tales, high tales, tales that are told and heard many, many times.

One tale is only ever told once."

(Neil Gaiman, The Sandman II "The Doll's House", Prologue: Tales in the Sand, 1990)

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