When I'm asked how to succeed in show business, I always say I haven't the foggiest.
It's kind of fun to listen to Christians who say: I'm a New Testament Christian. What other kind of Christian is there?
If you represent the Earth's lifetime by a single year, say from January when it was made to December, the 21st-century would be a quarter of a second in June - a tiny fraction of the year. But even in this concertinaed cosmic perspective, our century is very, very special: the first when humans can change themselves and their home planet.
People that want to talk can talk. Even a parrot talks. People are always going to have their thoughts on what they're going to say.
The least one can say of power is that a vocation for it is suspicious.
The trouble with talking too fast is you may say something you haven't thought of yet.
Women in my focus groups, they say a bald man is trustworthy. He has nothing to hide.
Any musician - I would say 99% of musicians - needs some help along the way. Most people, even if they're self-produced, have someone else mix it, or they'll have someone else master the record. Inevitably, it's like somebody else's personality being put into your art.
Voters don't have to love him, Romney advisers say, but they will respect him.
Well - I started writing - probably in the early 60s and by say '65-'66 I had read most of the poetry that had been published - certainly in the 20 years prior to that.
Beethoven's fourth and seventh symphonies have a certain amount in common. Well, of course they're both written by Beethoven, but besides that, I would say their overall effect and idea is to provide the listener with an incredible sense of joy.
I know there are writers who like to say that every novel is hard, and it doesn't get easier. That may be the case, and I've only written two. But the first, to me, was characterized by an enduring oscillation between perseverance and a profound doubt.
It's a lot easier to do good work when you have good words to say and work with good people.
I say if you fight terrorism, it's based in fear, but if you promote peace, it's based on hope.
It's probably foolish to expect relationships to go on forever and to say that because something only lasts 10 years, it's a failure.
Normally, we see characters that have God complexes. How interesting, I thought, it would be to capitalize on that. And say, OK, well fine, you have a God complex, well this person has a Satan complex. And the doctor chooses to treat him scientifically.
The whole reason people fill their homes with furry carnivores and not with, say, iguanas and turtles, is because mammals offer something no reptile ever will. They give affection, they want affection, and respond to our emotions the way we do to theirs.
Gay marriage will be universally accepted in time. But if I may be so bold as to say to gays and lesbians, don't wait for that time to arrive. Just as my father and his generation did not 'wait' for their civil rights, nor should you. The toothpaste ain't going back in the tube. The tide has turned.
If our women are willing to die with us, who is there to say no?
I think we present extreme aspects of human behavior and hopefully get at times, messages across or bring issues to the table or as we so often say, shed light into the dark crevices of human nature.
My job is to form the people, the story, the sentences. Every reader will bring their own life and their own history to the story and shape it accordingly. I guess you can say it's like I am sending them a letter.
There's a guy in London named Ben Cohen who is doing great things. In a way, we need people like Ben - we need straight guys to come out and say, 'What're you worried about? Get over yourself.' That's what we need! Because no one's listening to us - certainly, no one is listening to me.
I always say now that I'm in my blonde years. Because since the end of my marriage, all of my girlfriends have been blonde.
My people and I have come to an agreement which satisfied us both. They are to say what they please, and I am to do what I please.
Absolute space, that is to say, the mark to which it would be necessary to refer the earth to know whether it really moves, has no objective existence.
I don't judge my effectiveness by how many words I say. I think liberals often see nuances in things... Conservatives tend to see things in black and white. It gives them an air of certainty and conviction that might make them more comfortable to watch.
For only as we ourselves, as adults, actually move and have our being in the state of love, can we be appropriate models and guides for our children. What we are teaches the child far more than what we say, so we must be what we want our children to become.
Could you say 'senator' instead of 'ma'am? It's just a thing. I worked so hard to get that title. I'd appreciate it.
If you say, I'm for equal pay, that's a reform. But if you say. I'm a feminist, that's a transformation of society.
And why do we, who say we oppose tyranny and demand freedom of speech, allow people to go to prison and be vilified, and magazines to be closed down on the spot, for suggesting another version of history.
Nowadays, people don't ask you how you are, they say, 'Are you busy?' meaning, 'Are you well?' If someone actually does ask you how you are, the most cheerful answer, of course, is a robust 'Busy!' to which the person will reply 'Good!'
He surprised me by his familiarity with details of movements and battles which I did not suppose had come to his knowledge. As he kept me talking for over half an hour, I flattered myself that what I had to say interested him.
An American may speak love with his lips; the Italian must say it with his eyes.
I always think everyone else is funnier than me. I look at other comedians and I say, 'I wish I was that good.' People think I'm funny, and I say, 'I'm not.'
I don't know what I would have done without believing in God. His support gives me power and energy to continue to be optimistic, to smile, not to be depressed. Sometimes, if things are not going so well, I don't cry. I say maybe it's meant to be.
So long as the system of competition in the production and exchange of the means of life goes on, the degradation of the arts will go on; and if that system is to last for ever, then art is doomed, and will surely die; that is to say, civilization will die.
