God be kind to all good Samaritans and also bad ones. For such is the kingdom of heaven.

Self pity is easily the most destructive of the non-pharmaceutical narcotics; it is addictive, gives momentary pleasure and separates the victim from reality.

Talking, talking. Spinning a web of words, pale walls of dreams, between myself and all I see.

We read five words on the first page of a really good novel and we begin to forget that we are reading printed words on a page; we begin to see images.

What art ought to do is tell stories which are moment-by-moment wonderful, which are true to human experience, and which in no way explain human experience.

The citizen can bring our political and governmental institutions back to life, make them responsive and accountable, and keep them honest. No one else can.

Fiction does not spring into the world fully grown, like Athena. It is the process of writing and rewriting that makes a fiction original, if not profound.

Art, of course, is a way of thinking, a way of mining reality.

As a rule of thumb I say, if Socrates, Jesus and Tolstoy wouldn't do it, don't.

When people are serving, life is no longer meaningless.

One of the many interesting challenges nature presents us is its apparent disinterest in maintaining the order humans crave.

The product has to work. It has to be a good product. An enormous number of them are all hype with no value at all. People get into them because they want to make a lot of quick, easy money.

I may as well cut my losses and make a hasty exit while I still had enough self-esteem to walk upright. Crawling was so demoralizing

When did I decide to go into business? Well, it wasn't a business, when I decided. It was simply a need to sing.

Healing with the clean, pure, beautiful agents of nature is surely the one method of all which appeals to most of us

Most people do not consider dawn to be an attractive experience - unless they are still up.

What really counts in life is the quiet meeting of every difficulty with the determination to get out of it all the good there is.

[On daughter Liza Minnelli] I think she decided to go into show business when she was an embryo, she kicked so much.

I have always known that it comes from deep within myself. I always knew what sound I wanted, and how I wanted to play. I knew everything, it just had to be developed.

Why is it fair that I should be paying a higher percentage of taxes than anyone else?