The historian, essentially, wants more documents than he can really use; the dramatist only wants more liberties than he can really take.

Under certain circumstances there are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea.

It's time to start living the life you've imagined.

Three things in human life are important. The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind.

We work in the dark - we do what we can - we give what we have. Our doubt is our passion, and our passion is our task. The rest is the madness of art.

Do not mind anything that anyone tells you about anyone else. Judge everyone and everything for yourself.

Everything about Florence seems to be colored with a mild violet, like diluted wine.

Excellence does not require perfection.

The Roman jurisprudence has the longest known history of any set of human institutions.

I'm yours for ever--for ever and ever. Here I stand; I'm as firm as a rock. If you'll only trust me, how little you'll be disappointed. Be mine as I am yours.

It's a complex fate, being an American, and one of the responsibilities it entails is fighting against a superstitious valuation of Europe.

The worst wounds, the deadliest of them, aren't the ones people see on the outside. They're the ones that make us bleed internally.

What helped me most were my failures and slumps - when I couldn't get work, people weren't interested in me or had written me off.

Laughter means nothing unless there have been tears.

I've always had a love for poetry and when I got signed to a record label I thought, 'How odd that I'm doing a record before a book of poetry.'

As a performer, I could be like, "I don't want to leave that in there." But as a producer, I have to leave it in there.

There is no divining-rod whose dip shall tell us at twenty what we shall most relish at thirty.

I never had a penny to my name, so I changed my name.

I was not the kind of a principal player that was so in demand that eight or 10 or 12 scripts came per month.

So many (too many) books are published every year, and it seems everyone is writing a book. Perhaps we should all be reading more and writing less!

If everyone is there to make a good film, everyone is down to earth, and everyone is there for the right reasons - the scale doesn't really matter I think.