You know, as a writer, I’m more of a listener than a writer, cuz if I hear something I will write it down.

You do projects with the hope they will be big and hope they will go beyond what you imagine.

Life is either a great adventure or nothing.

New ideas pass through three periods: 1) It can’t be done. 2) It probably can be done, but it’s not worth doing. 3) I knew it was a good idea all along!

Art is the beautiful way of doing things. Science is the effective way of doing things. Business is the economic way of doing things.

I think some people would love to be able to make the clothes I make – and of course, I do influence them, but they keep simplifying, and minimalism doesn’t quite work.

Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known.

Trust in dreams, for in them is hidden the gate to eternity.

I love dresses, and I’ve definitely thought about designing them someday. I just want to make sure that I wait until the time is perfect and I can do it right.

Let us be sure that those who come after will say of us in our time, that in our time we did everything that could be done. We finished the race; we kept them free; we kept the faith.

I’ve had two cancer bouts in my years on the Court, and the first one, Justice O’Connor told me, ‚Now, you do the chemotherapy on Friday because you’ll get over it during the weekend and you can be back in court on Monday.‘

Some critics will write ‚Maya Angelou is a natural writer‘ – which is right after being a natural heart surgeon.

Writing, to me, is simply thinking through my fingers.

I’d like to think you don’t stop being creative once you get happy.

I have never started a poem yet whose end I knew. Writing a poem is discovering.

Almost always, the creative dedicated minority has made the world better.

To those of you who received honours, awards and distinctions, I say well done. And to the C students, I say you, too, can be president of the United States.

I didn’t want to be a writer, but I became one. And now I have many readers, in many countries. I think that’s a miracle. So I think I have to be humble regarding this ability. I’m proud of it and I enjoy it, and it is strange to say it this way, but I respect it.

If you’ve heard this story before, don’t stop me, because I’d like to hear it again.

I think it’s fair to say that personal computers have become the most empowering tool we’ve ever created. They’re tools of communication, they’re tools of creativity, and they can be shaped by their user.

I have certain guys who I looked up to. Jordan, Kobe, those guys. Passing that on to doing my part to kind of keep that influence of basketball where it should be is kind of why I play the game.

The good thing about having chemistry is, when you get to the improv section of a scene, you’ve got somebody to feed off. It can go on and on and on, and the sky’s the limit.

I have tried for much of my life to write as if I was composing my sentences to be read posthumously.

There is no blue without yellow and without orange.

If you really want to know what Middle-earth is based on, it’s my wonder and delight in the earth as it is, particularly the natural earth.

I’m not a big believer in trying to jam stuff down somebody’s throat: ‚You’re going to do it my way.‘ I’d rather show by example and live my life and have people say, ‚You know what, I want to live like Joel has. He’s got peace and joy, and he seems content.‘

There are a thousand thoughts lying within a man that he does not know till he takes up a pen to write.

Writing is my love. If you love something, you find a lot of time. I write for two hours a day, usually starting at midnight; at times, I start at 11.

I try not to think about anything special while running. As a matter of fact, I usually run with my mind empty. However, when I run empty-minded, something naturally and abruptly crawls in sometime. That might become an idea that can help me with my writing.

I’m really bad with answering questions. Usually, I don’t even answer them. I try to find inspiration inside of the question. I think, and I jump from one beam of inspiration or energy to the next, as opposed to explaining the energy.

There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.

To write it, it took three months; to conceive it three minutes; to collect the data in it all my life.

It is written on the arched sky; it looks out from every star. It is the poetry of Nature; it is that which uplifts the spirit within us.

Water is the driving force of all nature.

I’m rather kind of old school, thinking that when an artist does his work, it’s no longer his… I just see what people make of it.

The most important thing is to try and inspire people so that they can be great in whatever they want to do.

Creative people don’t behave very well generally. If you’re looking for examples of good relationships in show business, you’re gonna be depressed real fast. I don’t have time for anything else right now but work and my daughter. She’s my first priority.

There is spontaneity to my work.

I just have a relationship with my imagination. It’s like my friend, almost.

The strongest influences in my life and my work are always whomever I love. Whomever I love and am with most of the time, or whomever I remember most vividly. I think that’s true of everyone, don’t you?

There is a soak-the-rich attitude in the air, a feeling that if you have a lot of money you must have got it by some ghastly means. I can quite happily say there was never any family money. All the money we got was mine, just from writing books.

I like being a writer.

When I found somebody who I fell in love with, it made me feel different than I felt the rest of the day. It was electrifying. That’s what inspired the ‚Off to the Races‘ melodies. That’s one of the times when you’re feeling electrified by someone else and they make you happy to be alive.

In business, success often depends upon the relative age of your ideas.

If you write in the same way over and over again, like, in the same place with the same techniques and with the same people, you’re sort of writing the same song over and over again.

My mother had a saying: ‚Kamala, you may be the first to do many things, but make sure you’re not the last.‘

The more I think about it, the more I realize there is nothing more artistic than to love others.

I wanted to get a job being creative, and I did.

Generally, a writer of force is anywhere from 20 years to 200 years ahead of his generation.

I’m wallowing in the whole idea of just being a guy out there with a band, with songs. It’s a real enjoyment.

I’m inspired by Walt Disney. I’m inspired by Howard Hughes. I’m inspired by Henry Ford. I’m inspired by Steve Jobs. I mean, I’m inspired by James Perse.

Every artist was first an amateur.

I can get where some scientists would say comedians are crazy. What you have to understand: A lot of comedians are dealing with a dark passion. A lot of these are guys coming from a tumultuous life, including myself. Some people need outlets, a way to express yourself.

I have Dalinian thought: the one thing the world will never have enough of is the outrageous.

I don’t want to make niche-oriented music.

No tears in the writer, no tears in the reader. No surprise in the writer, no surprise in the reader.

Without this playing with fantasy no creative work has ever yet come to birth. The debt we owe to the play of the imagination is incalculable.

If you are lucky enough to find something that you love, and you have a shot at being good at it, don’t stop, don’t put it down.

Free people, remember this maxim: we may acquire liberty, but it is never recovered if it is once lost.

Originality is a thing we constantly clamour for, and constantly quarrel with.

My style influences my music and everything around me.