I believe in poetic discourse, in the value of speech in a non-naturalistic way; it's speculative.

I never 'say' anything in my work. I invent a world. Let others decide what is being 'said'.

We are suffocated by writers who want to enlighten us with their truths. For me, the theatre is beautiful because it is a secret, and secrets seduce us, we all want to share secrets.

Theatre should be a taxing experience: the greatest achievement of a writer is to produce a character who creates anxiety.

I don't like sympathetic characters.

I'm not interested in observed reality.

I submit all my plays to the National Theatre for rejection. To assure myself I am seeing clearly.

When I write, I am not giving a lecture, I am speculating on behavior. Sometimes this is dangerous, but it should be. As I say often, theatre is a dark place and we should keep the light out of it.

The artist who makes himself accessible is self-destructive.

I have plenty of political views and plenty of social and personal prejudices. I do not, however, value them.

A good play puts the audience through a certain ordeal.

A lot of people here some South in your mouth, and they automatically think you're dumb. They think if you talk funny, you are funny. – Lloyd Hand

Thanksgiving comes after Christmas.

There is no refuge from confession but suicide and suicide is confession.

Some unanswered prayers are only because God doesn't want to do something for us. He wants to do something through us.

If both Church and fairy-tale belong to humanity, they may occasionally cross circles, without injury to either.

Dear Daddy-Long-Legs, You never answered my question and it was very important. ARE YOU BALD?

The important thing about women today is, as they get older, they still keep house. It's one reason why they don't die, but men die when they retire. Women just polish the teacups.

Writers who go to Hollywood still follow the classic pattern: either you get disgusted by 'them' and you leave or you want the money and you become them.

As we create synergy among the roles of our lives, there's more of us to put into the time we have.

We were not just competitors and colleagues, we were friends. We had a lot of opportunities to reflect on this in the last year. It was a competitive brotherhood.