The whole magic of a plot requires that somebody be impeded from getting something over with.

People have been modeling their lives after films for years, but the medium is somehow unsuited to moral lessons, cautionary tales or polemics of any kind.

Idle people are often bored and bored people, unless they sleep a lot, are cruel. It is not accident that boredom and cruelty are great preoccupations in our time.

Bored people, unless they sleep a lot, are cruel.

Lyda was an exuberant, even a dramatic gardener.... She was always holding up a lettuce or a bunch of radishes with an air of resolute courage, as though she had shot them herself.

Fear . . . is forward. No one is afraid of yesterday.

There follows a little obscenity here, a dash of philosophy there, considerable whining overall, and a modern satirical novel is born.

My dislike has no consequences. It accrues only in my mind—like preserves on a shelf or guns zeroing in, and never firing.

No one ever confides a secret to one person only. No one destroys all copies of a document.

My capacity for having a good time exists. It surfaces, however, on odd occasions.

Nothing defines the quality of life in a community more clearly than people who regard themselves, or whom the consensus chooses to regard, as mentally unwell.

Freedom or prison--what's the difference? A man must develop unwavering will power subject only to his reason.

I want to be challenged. Every job I've done so far, every character has been completely different and that's really important to me because I don't want to fall into a stereotypical box.

The best there is, the best there was, and the best there ever will be

The only time you mustn't fail is the last time you try.

If you think individual, that's how you're going to come off. I've always given 'team' a chance.

Every work brings new and different challenges. Research is always helpful, regardless of whether the play is contemporary or not.

You can't condemn me for wanting you, unless you condemn every other man who has." -Clayton Westmoreland

It's hard for the modern generation to understand Thoreau, who lived beside a pond but didn't own water skis or a snorkel.

I think there's a passion for God like never before

The secret to having everything you want out of life is the realization that you really don't want most of the things you think you want.