Most people who are writers go through periods when they can't write.

Memory blurs, that's the point. If memory didn't blur you wouldn't have the fool's courage to do things again, again, again, that tear you apart.

Reading is the sole means by which we slip, involuntarily, often helplessly, into another's skin, another's voice, another's soul.

I never change, I simply become more myself.

How lovely this world is, really: one simply has to look.

Our enemy is by tradition our savior, in preventing us from superficiality.

Read widely, and without apology. Read what you want to read, not what someone tells you you should read.

Night comes to the desert all at once, as if someone turned off the light.

Keep a light, hopeful heart. But ­expect the worst.

See, people come into your life for a reason. They might not know it themselves, why. You might not know it. But there's a reason. There has to be

Be your own editor/critic. Sympathetic but merciless!

You can do it. That thing you just thought of, you can do it.

Show the world there's something to fight for. Your life is the proof that beauty can still be attained.

How do I have productive days with minimum drama? Simple

His peaceful resistance shook the foundations of an empire, exposed the emptiness of a repressive ideology, and proved that moral leadership is more powerful than any weapon.

Honoring the moment is honoring every human being you meet. The only place where you can meet them is in the moment.

A strategy that doesn't take into account resources is doomed to failure.

I think that truth is stranger than fiction, and it's nice to know the people you're making a movie about.

Basically, I'm a writer. I'm the proprietor of the vision. I alone know what I eventually want to happen on the screen. So if you have a valuable idea, the only way to protect it is to direct it.

Video screenshot Facts and figures from Nelson Mandela's life, set to the trailer from 'Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom.' "Man's goodness is a flame that can be hidden but never extinguished."

When people get at each other's throat, the rich and the poor and the Left and the Right and so on, and you have a basic breakdown, that becomes very threatening.