Power is not an institution, and not a structure; neither is it a certain strength we are endowed with; it is the name that one attributes to a complex strategical situation in a particular society.

Schools serve the same social functions as prisons and mental institutions- to define, classify, control, and regulate people.

I don't feel that it is necessary to know exactly what I am. The main interest in life and work is to become someone else that you were not in the beginning.

People know what they do; frequently they know why they do what they do; but what they don't know is what what they do does.

Where there is power, there is resistance.

There is no power relation without the correlative constitution of a field of knowledge, nor any knowledge that does not presuppose and constitute at the same time power relations

Search for what is good and strong and beautiful in your society and elaborate from there. Push outward. Always create from what you already have. Then you will know what to do.

From the idea that the self is not given to us, I think there is only one practical consequence: we have to create ourselves as a work of art.

Are the prisons overpopulated, or is the population over-imprisoned ?

I am hopelessly in love with a memory. An echo from another time, another place.

Power is tolerable only on condition that it mask a substantial part of itself. Its success is proportional to its ability to hide its own mechanisms.

I certainly don't disparage someone whose attitude towards their work is utterly different from mine - that's up to them.

'Matterhorn' is my metaphor of the Vietnam War - we built it, we abandoned it, we assaulted it, we lost, and then we abandoned it again.

DISCUSSION, n. A method of confirming others in their errors.

To accomplish great things, we must not only act, but also dream; not only plan, but also believe.

I've always said that the more coordinated the efforts of the international community are, the better it will be for democracy in Burma.

How irritating it must be for people, to be bombarded with me!

Oh my God, baby, you are in so much trouble.

I could almost say it is my religion. I guess that sounds pretentious, but I want to live and breathe cinema.

He knew he had no right to touch her, crave her like air, but he did both. And when he put his mouth on hers, he recognized the taste of her, like she'd been made just for him.

Rock 'n' roll was two pegs below being a prisoner of war back then.