Watching a woman make Russian pancakes, you might think that she was calling on the spirits or extracting from the batter the philosopher's stone.

Knowledge is of no value unless you put it into practice.

Any idiot can face a crisis - it's day to day living that wears you out.

Love, friendship and respect do not unite people as much as common hatred for something.

Do silly things. Foolishness is a great deal more vital and healthy than our straining and striving after a meaningful life.

Everything on earth is beautiful, everything -- except what we ourselves think and do when we forget the higher purposes of life and our own human dignity.

The task of a writer is not to solve the problem but to state the problem correctly.

Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.

What a fine weather today! Can’t choose whether to drink tea or to hang myself.

People should be beautiful in every way - in their faces, in the way they dress, in their thoughts, and in their innermost selves.

Life is given only once, and one wants to live it boldly, with full conscious and beauty.

All things, even the deepest sorrow or the most profound happiness are all temporary. Hope is fuel for the soul, without hope, forward motion ceases.

You like to write. It's the single most important quality for someone who wants to be a writer. But not in itself enough.

What is it like.... what is it like to be dead?' Evan looked at him with his dull, unblinking blue eyes, ' I don't know, what is it like...... to be alive?

Love is accepting people for who they are and what they are, regardless.

Nothing can be more sublime this side of heaven than the singing of this noble Psalm by a vast congregation. It is all ablaze with grateful adoration.

Hero­ism breaks its heart, and ide­al­ism its back, on the intran­si­gence of the cred­u­lous and the mediocre, manip­u­lated by the cyn­i­cal and the corrupt.

Always, if you win mentally, you can win physically as well.

I have had many opportunities to visit universities all over the world in the past 50 years.

So whatever I find true for myself, other people might also relate to.

Ive never had to fight hard for anything Ive gotten in the past.