Above all, she wanted to look as though she had not given the matter a moment's thought, and that would take time.

The cost of oblivious daydreaming was always this moment of return, the realignment with what had been before and now seemed a little worse.

Wasn't writing a kind of soaring, an achievable form of flight, of fancy, of the imagination?

And though you think the world is at your feet, it can rise up and tread on you.

He knew these last lines by heart and mouthed them now in the darkness. My reason for life. Not living, but life. That was the touch. And she was his reason for life, and why he must survive.

At that moment, the urge to be writing was stronger than any notion she had of what she might write.

We go on our hands and knees and crawl our way towards the truth

In that shrinking moment he discovered that he had never hated anyone until now. It was a feeling as pure as love, but dispassionate and icily rational.

It wasn't torpor that kept her - she was often restless to the point of irritability. She simply liked to feel that she was prevented from leaving, that she was needed.

He had never before felt so self-consciously young, nor experienced such appetite, such impatience for the story to begin.

Waiting. Simply one person doing nothing, over time, while another approached.

Art lives upon discussion, upon experiment, upon curiosity, upon variety of attempt, upon the exchange of views and the comparison of standpoints.

The condition of an enlightened mind is a surrendered heart.

A great smile is a wonderful asset, but a good heart is pure gold.

Needing people yet being afraid of them is wearing me out.

I love working with children and this young boy, Thomas Sangster, is quite a remarkable young actor. He raises your game, you know. He certainly raised mine.

Since the trainee is both inefficient and unadapted, only a few basic exercises should be used, and they should be repeated frequently to establish the basic motor pathways and basic strength.

Either the soul survives death or it does not, and there is no scientific evidence that it does.

I was born in Georgia. That's where my grandparents-and all my people-are from. But my family traveled a great deal because my dad was in the army as a helicopter pilot.

Modern American magic, late 20th century magic, is tremendously disrespectful of the audience.

As against having beautiful workshops, studies, etc., one writes best in a cellar on a rainy day.