History has shown us all too often the consequences of dreaming poorly or not at all.

I always try to be alert to the potential for repetition, for a decaying orbit with regard to my use of technique, etc.

Some questions will ruin you if you are denied the answer long enough.

When you think about the complexity of our natural world - plants using quantum mechanics for photosynthesis, for example - a smartphone begins to look like a pretty dumb object.

The map had been the first form of misdirection, for what is a map but a way of emphasizing some things and making other things invisible?

Nothing that lived and breathed was truly objective—even in a vacuum, even if all that possessed the brain was a self-immolating desire for the truth.

There's also a lot of gritty Americana type of bands. I actually have a lot of Britpop on my iPod, too.

I also am not particularly risk-averse - I don't mind jumping off a cliff if I trust the people who've told me they'll catch me at the bottom.

Imbuing fiction with a life that extends beyond the last word is in some ways the goal: the ending that goes beyond the ending in the reader's mind, so invested are they in the story.

So many differing opinions and philosophies... are rarely housed under the roof of a single magazine.

Literary influences are harder for me to point to, because mostly it's a mulch of all of my past reading.

The fire of kindness can melt the most hateful heart.

There is no greater evil than killing. I don't care whether they call it war or justice. Life is precious.

All crimes, all hatreds, all wars can be reduced to unhappiness.

I don't care what you bench. I care if you have friends and family you love, a career that you love, and helped someone you don't know today.

Concision in art is a necessity and an elegance. The verbose painter bores: who will get rid of all these trimmings?

Hey, I didn't make a big deal out of Hotel California. The 18 million people that bought it did.

The biggest one [trade deal], a multinational one known as CAFTA, I voted against. And because I hold the same standards as I look at all of these trade deals.

And in man is a three-pound brain which, as far as we know, is the most complex and orderly arrangement of matter in the universe.

When you aren't affiliated with anything, and then you look at something, you look at it with your eye to the best of your ability.

If you want your life to be more rewarding, you have to change the way you think.