I have not worked out my poems with a careful will, falling rather on haphazard and blind formulation of wordage, a more flowing concept, in a hope for a more new and lively path. I do personalize at times, but this only for the grace and elan of the dance.

Writing is the most fun you can have by yourself.

When you’re traveling constantly, every day you become inspired, and it shows in my work, sonically, lyrically, visually. Conversations with women with different accents and stories told in those accents. I like to create characters based on different people I’ve met, and relationships. I like to tell stories loosely based on real-life events.

For instance, I’m always fascinated to see whether, given the kind of fairly known and established form called popular music, whether there is some magic combination that nobody has hit upon before.

I’m never going to go to Mars, but I’ve helped inspire, thank goodness, the people who built the rockets and sent our photographic equipment off to Mars.

I never had to choose a subject – my subject rather chose me.

Deep down, I know I have this intuition or instinct that a lot of creative people have, that their demons are also what make them create.

Painting, I think it’s like jazz.

I believe in sketching because there is something very sensitive in sketching, you know, in sketches that you don’t have out of a computer that looks the same like everybody even if, later on, the dresses are OK, but I like to sketch, and I like to see trails made after my sketches that look the same. It is you know, what I like.

To have faith is to trust yourself to the water. When you swim you don’t grab hold of the water, because if you do you will sink and drown. Instead you relax, and float.

‚The Lion‘ all began with a picture of a faun carrying an umbrella and parcels in a snowy wood. This picture had been in my mind since I was about sixteen. Then one day, when I was about forty, I said to myself, ‚Let’s try to make a story about it.‘

Does wisdom perhaps appear on the earth as a raven which is inspired by the smell of carrion?

It’s the way I study – to understand something by trying to work it out or, in other words, to understand something by creating it. Not creating it one hundred percent, of course; but taking a hint as to which direction to go but not remembering the details. These you work out for yourself.

Many of my fans often tell me that they listen to my songs to get through things. And therefore, obviously, I hope that they can picture being in a place where things are better… I hope my songs can bring people to a calm place.

But let there be spaces in your togetherness and let the winds of the heavens dance between you. Love one another but make not a bond of love: let it rather be a moving sea between the shores of your souls.

You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing and dance, and write poems and suffer and understand, for all that is life.

I wanted very much to learn to draw, for a reason that I kept to myself: I wanted to convey an emotion I have about the beauty of the world.

I like having my hands in the clay. I like the movie-making process.

If it weren’t for the Beatles, I would not be a musician.

I guess I’m just inspired to tell stories.

Hope is not a resting place but a starting point – a cactus, not a cushion.

There’s so much about Dolly Parton that every female artist should look to, whether it’s reading her quotes or reading her interviews or going to one of her live shows. She’s been such an amazing example to every female songwriter out there.

U2’s best work has always been when we didn’t know what we’re doing.

My dad used to have an expression – ‚It is the lucky person who gets up in the morning, puts both feet on the floor, knows what they are about to do, and thinks it still matters.‘

I feel like in my music I can be a rebel. I can say things I wouldn’t say in real life.

Ideas are the beginning points of all fortunes.

People want to feel hopeful.

In writing, I apply my feminine side and respect the mystery involved in creation.

Ambition has one heel nailed in well, though she stretch her fingers to touch the heavens.

I don’t think of poetry as a ‚rational‘ activity but as an aural one. My poems usually begin with words or phrases which appeal more because of their sound than their meaning, and the movement and phrasing of a poem are very important to me.

Oh, you weak, beautiful people who give up with such grace. What you need is someone to take hold of you – gently, with love, and hand your life back to you.

When I heard ‚Jesus, Take the Wheel,‘ I was like, OK. Some people look at it as a song written for an American Idol, Carrie Underwood, who is wonderful. But when you’re a songwriter listening to a song, you hear something else. I heard that song, and wow.

Like a pianist runs her fingers over the keys, I’ll search my mind for what to say. Now, the poem may want you to write it. And then sometimes you see a situation and think, ‚I’d like to write about that.‘ Those are two different ways of being approached by a poem, or approaching a poem.

That is what we are supposed to do when we are at our best – make it all up – but make it up so truly that later it will happen that way.

Good night, good night! Parting is such sweet sorrow, that I shall say good night till it be morrow.

I like the sound a typewriter makes.

Man’s only true happiness is to live in hope of something to be won by him. Reverence something to be worshipped by him, and love something to be cherished by him, forever.

Whenever I’m around some who is modest, I think, ‚Run like hell and all of fire.‘ You don’t want modesty, you want humility.

I’m inspired by people who keep on rolling, no matter their age.

People may think I’m trying something new by telling stories, but they’re just jokes connected to give the illusion of stories. But really, I just continue using my imagination and creating. That’s what I do.

The whole ‚enigmatic artist‘ thing, I just ran with it.

Even if you’re on the right track, you’ll get run over if you just sit there.

I went to see ‚Phantom of the Opera‘ with my grandma and my mom when I was very little. The stage, the voice, the music… Composer Andrew Lloyd Webber has been a massive inspiration to me for some time – the storytelling, that deliciously somber undertone in his music.

I believe that one person can make a difference.

I think my first album opened a lot of doors for me to push the freedom of speech to the limit.

Some of the stories I admire seem to zero in on one particular time and place. There isn’t a rule about this. But there’s a tidy sense about many stories I read. In my own work, I tend to cover a lot of time and to jump back and forward in time, and sometimes the way I do this is not very straightforward.

And you find as a writer there are certain spots on the planet where you write better than others, and I believe in that. And New Orleans is one of them.

I don’t think I’d ever apologise for music I make, no.

I do have motivation. A lot of motivation.

Humor has bailed me out of more tight situations than I can think of. If you go with your instincts and keep your humor, creativity follows. With luck, success comes, too.

If you love something – and there are things that I love – you do want more and more and more of it, but that’s not the way to produce good work. So as an author, I need to write what I need to write.

Example is not the main thing in influencing others. It is the only thing.

People do not decide to become extraordinary. They decide to accomplish extraordinary things.

A small body of determined spirits fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission can alter the course of history.

Beauties in vain their pretty eyes may roll; charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.

Life imitates art far more than art imitates Life.

I read all the time, and I’m often struck by something I’m reading.

Why need I volumes, if one word suffice?

Because, you know, resilience – if you think of it in terms of the Gold Rush, then you’d be pretty depressed right now because the last nugget of gold would be gone. But the good thing is, with innovation, there isn’t a last nugget. Every new thing creates two new questions and two new opportunities.

As a kid, I used to see how Sachin Tendulkar used to win matches under pressure for India in Sharjah or other places. So I was always keen to repeat the same in similar situations. I don’t take pressure on myself when I am in the middle. I love pressure, and I always believe that pressure makes you more focused.

When I have an idea, I turn down the flame, as if it were a little alcohol stove, as low as it will go. Then it explodes and that is my idea.