I think, actually, everyone starts out with some strange in them. It's just whether or not you decide to keep it.

I do, I’m afraid, understand books far more readily than I understand people. Books are so easy to get along with.

It's like eight thousand birds, Charles! Charles! Isn't it like eight thousand birds?

Books crowbar the world open for you.

No harm in listening. Alexei's a child, not a wizard. We don't lose control of our brains by listening.

You will never be tougher than you are now. Children are the toughest creatures on the planet. They endure.

Sometimes it seemed difficult for the adults in Sophie's life to tell between 'carried away' and 'absolutely correct but unbelieved.

You have been the great green adventure of my life. Without you my days would be unlit.

It is difficult to believe extraordinary things.

Let me introduce you. Sophie, this is Miss Eliot, from the National Childcare Agency. Miss Eliot, this is Sophie, from the ocean.

Only weak thinkers do not love the sky.

Desire is a frightening thing.

Taking no chances means wasting your dreams..

Finding opportunity is a matter of believing it's there.

Know your genre. Know your history. Read a book.

I'm a lot luckier than most people, although I used to look at it the other way around-that so many people seemed luckier than me.

If work is just going in every day and getting a check, it's an ugly life. When you can make work a meaningful purpose, you've hit the jackpot for people.

Every great leader has a generosity gene.

To put up with. . . distortions and to stick to one's guns come what may - this is the. . . gift of leadership.

In fact any experiment that measures a quantum effect is one in which the quantum effect is aligned with the behavior of some heavy, macroscopic object; that's how we measure it

Stop trying to make ‘fetch’ happen. It’s not going to happen!