Isolation is a big part of songwriting.

It's much easier to write when you're sad. But you can end up isolated and depressed because you almost need to put yourself in that situation to have that angst to write from.

Ignore reality, there's nothing you can do about it.

Happy songs are very difficult to write. How many truly great upbeat songs are there?

I can understand why some people might look at me and say, 'What's she got to be depressed about?' I get that a lot in Britain, where mental health issues seem to be a big taboo.

I'm such a chameleon. I never get bored.

Saving animals is as simple as choosing synthetic alternatives instead of real fur.

If I start feeling down I'll gorge myself on pasta. That usually does the trick. It's the Italian blood in me.

Enjoy every moment: you never know when things might change.

It was only cool to have blond hair and be a surfer chick [in Sydney]. I could learn how to surf, but I still looked Italian. It took me a long time to realize that was a good thing.

I wasn't born with a natural talent for songwriting.

The great ages did not perhaps produce much more talent than ours, ' [T.S.] Eliot wrote. 'But less talent was wasted.

What a comfort it was for me to know that no matter where I was in the world, my mother was praying for me.

Epigram: a wisecrack that has played Carnegie Hall.

I just talk a lot, that's the problem.

But Valentine, why despair, why always paint the future in such sombre hues?" Maximilien asked. "Because, my friend, I judge it by the past.

We must never lose sight of the fact that the law has a moral foundation, and we must never fail to ask ourselves not only what the law is, but what the law should be.

I'm very shy. That's probably one of the reasons I got so heavily into drugs.

There are always new, grander challenges to confront, and a true winner will embrace each one.

Everyone gets wounded in this world and everyone has within them some golden qualities that can serve to heal the wounds of time and the traumatic effects of human tragedy.

I think the darker aspect of my fiction-or anybody's fiction-is by its very nature somehow easier to talk about.