My mother had to explain that one couldnt compose a Liszt rhapsody because it was a piece of music that Liszt himself had composed.

There are still so many beautiful things to be said in C major.

My chief virtue (or if you like, defect) has been a tireless lifelong search for an original, individual musical idiom. I detest imitation, I detest hackneyed devices.

Formalism is music that people don't understand at first hearing.

I detest imitation, I detest hackneyed devices.

I want nothing better, more flexible or more complete than the sonata form, which contains everything necessary for my structural purposes.

At home we didnt talk about religion. So gradually the question faded away by itself and disappeared from the agenda. When I was nineteen my father died; my response to his death was atheistic.

If your heart has been broken nine times, muster the courage to love again for the tenth.

With them the individual counted for nothing. No one was irreplaceable, because they drew no distinction between one man and another... In this community there was harmony, but no love.

For heaven's sake, don't write writing. Write reading!

Whether or not the President is sleeping well won't be a factor in his re-election. That will depend on what he does while he is awake.

Blest leisure is our curse; like that of Cain, It, makes us wander, wander earth around, To fly that tyrant Thought. As Atlas groan'd The world beneath, we groan beneath an hour.

No single answer can hold the truth of a good heart.

I have not lived as a woman. I have lived as a man. I've just done what I damn well wanted to, and I've made enough money to support myself, and ain't afraid of being alone

I used to think hard work made me come alive, honestly. I used to have a daily work schedule with millions of things on it and I thought, "This is wonderful!"

Once the travel bug bites, there is no known antidote.

I write the way women have babies. You don't know it's going to be like that. If you did, there's no way you would go through with it.