I'm not a speed writer. I write slowly and revise obsessively. The end result tends to be good. That's where my strength is.

When we are children we seldom think of the future. This innocence leaves us free to enjoy ourselves as few adults can. The day we fret about the future is the day we leave our childhood behind.

Words are pale shadows of forgotten names. As names have power, words have power. Words can light fires in the minds of men. Words can wring tears from the hardest hearts.

I have, of course, been called many other things. Most of them uncouth, although very few were unearned

The world is a mess and I just need to rule it.

Half of seeming clever is keeping your mouth shut at the right times.

It's like everyone tells a story about themselves inside their own head. Always. All the time. That story makes you what you are. We build ourselves out of that story.

It was wise enough to know itself, and brave enough to be itself, and wild enough to change itself while somehow staying altogether true.

If I seem to wander, if I seem to stray, remember that true stories seldom take the straightest way

There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man.

Do not mistake me for my mask. You see light dappling on the water and forget the deep, cold dark beneath.

Statecraft and kingship were not for the faint of heart

What would it be like if I could accept life--accept this moment--exactly as it is?

Taking no chances means wasting your dreams.

I'll play what you want or I won't play at all.

Don't regret your mistakes. You'll always make mistakes. The better you are, the less mistakes you make. The only way to get better is to thoroughly analyze your mistakes.

I could have been better. That's my goal now, to be better.

What is a well-chosen collection of pictures, but walls hung round with thoughts?

Militarism is in direct competition with people's needs for food, health care, and environmental protection.

Richer than I you can never be, I had a mother who read to me.

Let us make our hearts as big as an ocean, to go beyond all the trifles of the world and see it only as a picture. We can then enjoy the world without being in any way affected by it.