A lot of people of my Ulster Protestant background would have been very suspicious of the notion of a film about Bloody Sunday. Our fear would have been that it would be terribly anti-Britain and anti-soldiers: a piece of nationalist propaganda.
The notion of a writer sitting in a library doing research isn't what I want. The research I love doing isn't found in a book. It's what it feels like to rappel down the side of a building; to train with a SWAT team; to hold a human brain in your hands; or to dive for pirate treasure. Those are things I've done to research my stories.
What I believe unites the people of this nation, regardless of race or region or party, young or old, rich or poor, is the simple, profound belief in opportunity for all - the notion that if you work hard and take responsibility, you can get ahead.
Large numbers of people are broken from the notion that the system is working for people, that the system is just or humane or peaceful.
I stand before you today to repudiate the ridiculous notion that the American people will not vote for qualified candidates simply because he is not white or because she is not a male.
There's this notion, kind of like unspoken, that you can't live your dreams and be a mom. You can't have a career and be a mom. There's still that preconceived notion, and I reject that.
Most people I know are not hard-core religious people. They are what I would call 'lightly religious.' So I don't buy the notion that we can't laugh about religion in America.
There's this notion that artists are supposed to be dumb and frivolous. I completely disagree with that.
The notion that Western religions are more rigid than those of Asia is overdrawn. Ours is the most permissive society history has ever known - almost the only thing that is forbidden now is to forbid - and Asian teachers and their progeny play up to this propensity by soft-pedaling Hinduism's, Buddhism's, Sufism's rules.
In a first pregnancy, you don't have a child yet, so you can nap and see movies and exercise. The notion of 'baby' is abstract. You look at the ultrasound and don't really understand that the creature you're seeing is soon going to be your roommate.
I want to do everything. I want to be the president, I want to learn Tae Kwan Do, I want to climb mountains. I'm always bugged by the notion that I can't do everything.
This old notion that work is drudgery is nonsense. Most days, even back when Xerox was under siege, I could not wait to get to the office.
I am generally wary of the demand for 'likeability' in fiction, which I think is a bastardisation of the demand of identification - itself something of a suspect notion.
The appeal of travel books is also the sense that you are different, an outsider, almost like the Robinson Crusoe or Christopher Columbus notion of being the first person in a new place.
The instant that movies became described as character driven was the instant when characters stopped mattering in movies. In other words, the birth of the notion of the character-driven movie coincided with the birth of movies in which characters were incidental to the very activities in which they engaged.
The decline and fall of the modern religious right's notion of a Christian America creates a calmer political environment and, for many believers, may help open the way for a more theologically serious religious life.
The man-made apocalypse we are facing was not written in the stars; it is a notion that grew like mould from the texts of a few frustrated, feather-wielding monks.
For people of color - especially African Americans - the idea that racist cops might frame members of their community is no abstract notion, let alone an exercise in irrational conspiracy theorizing. Rather, it speaks to a social reality about which blacks are acutely aware.
I absolutely don't relate to being beaten down my whole life - I had amazing opportunities at a young age - but there is still in many, many people's minds the notion that I'll never be able to escape Harry Potter.
I toyed with the notion of being an actor, and am so glad that this whim did not go any further.
The mechanics of love imply some sort of bridge between the sensual and the spiritual, sometimes to the point of deification; the notion of an afterlife is implicit not only in our couplings, but also in our separations.
The ultimate vision is to instate in the Muslim world the notion of multiculturalism, which is part of our heritage and history, part of the fundamental, mainstream ideals of Islam.
The notion that we would market devices that would allow someone to place themselves beyond the law troubles me a lot.
According to Mr. Obama, exceptionalism is so yesterday, an uncool, antiquated and ultimately destructive notion.
I cannot express it: but surely you and everybody have a notion that there is, or should be, an existence of yours beyond you.
The only thing I was fit for was to be a writer, and this notion rested solely on my suspicion that I would never be fit for real work, and that writing didn't require any.
We have the notion that we exist but we have no way to prove it. 'I am' is the closest foundation we can get.
The notion that a company would give up on this nation to get a tax break isn't going to sit well with the American people.
The romantic notion of the clubhouse as a traveling fraternity of working-class heroes - the boys of summer - is perhaps the most potent in all of baseball.
I go into meetings, and people have this preconceived notion of me that I didn't work hard to get where I am.
I suppose the common idea of me is that I'm going to be someone who's hyper and cracking jokes all the time, but people who meet me are soon disabused of that notion.
I have a notion that if you are going to be spiritually curious, you better not get cluttered up with too many material things.
The notion that the 'leader' has the right to ask huge sacrifices of your generation for a notional future paradise - if you'd be good enough to lie down under the wheels of the juggernaut - that sentimental and self-aggrandising rationalisation for brute force and cowardice I felt from adolescence was wrong.
Truth is an illusory notion.
Ever since I was a kid, I've always been fascinated by the Arthurian Legend, and, you know, the notion of nobility in battle and the - the notion of chivalry.
In the '70s and '80s, the mentality of America was that everything was disposable. The notion of quality wasn't important.
