There is only one thing I can say about the Shah- he knows how to draw a crowd.

I want the standard of living in Iran in ten years' time to be exactly on a level with that in Europe today. In twenty years' time we shall be ahead of the United States.

My main mistake was to have made an ancient people advance by forced marches toward independence, health, culture, affluence, comfort.

To be first in the Middle East is not enough. We must raise ourselves to the level of a great world power.

Let the dog bark; the moon shall beam on.

You approach the Mullahs as if they are normal people. They are not. You see them in your own image; you should not.

Muslim brothers be damned; they're our greatest enemies. You know yourself that I'm a Muslim, even a fanatical Muslim. But that does nothing to alter my opinion of the Arabs.

Thank God we in Iran have neither the desire nor the need to suffer from democracy.

My advisers built a wall between myself and my people. I didn't realize what was happening. When I woke up, I had lost my people.

Nobody can influence me, nobody. Still less a woman. Women are important in a man's life only if they're beautiful and charming and keep their femininity.

They want liberalization! I'll give them liberalization. I'll loosen the screws until the Americans beg me to tighten them again.

The Secret Revealer is the Righteous God.

There had never been any more between us thanchance had brought. But perhaps that makes a greater indebtednessand binds closer than much else

Wild animals never kill for sport. Man is the only one to whom the torture and death of his fellow creatures is amusing in itself.

Once you enter the public's eye, you have to be aware that you give up a huge part of your own life.

All abstract sciences are nothing but the study of relations between signs.

My soul bleeds and the blood steadily, silently, disturbingly slowly, swallows me whole.

When Republicans used reconciliation in 2001 for the Bush tax cuts, they used it to increase the deficit. The whole purpose of reconciliation is for deficit reduction!

No love can be bound by oath or covenant to secure it against a higher love.

My daughter is here in town doing a play, and her dog is staying with us. We live up in the hills, so he has access to thousands of acres of wilderness.

You can't tell a millionaire's son from a billionaire's.