I have put my whole soul into this work [The Pathetique Symphony] . . . You cannot imagine what joy I feel at the thought that my days are not yet over and that I may still accomplish much.

Music is an incomparably more powerful means and is a subtler language for expressing the thousand different moments of the soul's moods.

Where the heart does not enter; there can be no music.

To regret the past, to hope in the future, and never to be satisfied with the present: that is what I spend my whole life doing

Truly there would be reason to go mad were it not for music.

Inspiration is a guest that does not willingly visit the lazy.

Madam, you ask me how I compose. I compose sitting down.

Music possesses much richer means of expression and it is a more subtle medium for translating the 1000 shifting moments of the feelings of the soul.

After the last notes of Gotterdammerung I felt as though I had been let out of prison.

I like the plot of The Nutcracker - not at all.

The creative process is like music which takes root with extraordinary force and rapidity

He walked into the bathroom, wincing at himself in the mirror, that always more tired older brother.

I was obsessed with being rich and famous.

Life is a business that does not cover the costs.

We sometimes differ more widely from ourselves than we do from others.

The one way the world hasn't changed: teaching is still the most important job.

Be prepared for the worst, my love, for it lives next door to the best.

A day without writing was a little death.

I have a rock garden. Last week three of them died.

Growing up, I didn't dream of being nothing, of living in the ghetto my whole life. I wanted to get out.

I will believe in the 500-channel world only when I see it.