We always strive after what is forbidden, and desire the things refused us.

My hopes are not always realized, but I always hope.

A horse never runs so fast as when he has other horses to catch up and outpace.

Quarrels are the dowry which married folk bring one another.

Be patient and tough; someday this pain will be useful to you.

Make the workmanship surpass the materials.

Love is no assignment for cowards.

Happy is the man who has broken the chains which hurt the mind, and has given up worrying once and for all.

The man who has experienced shipwreck shudders even at a calm sea.

Dripping water hollows out stone, not through force but through persistence.

If you want to be loved, be lovable.

The function of the overwhelming majority of your artwork is simply to teach you how to make the small fraction of your artwork that soars.

There is no gap as wide as the one between mediocrity and genius.

Unfortunately when I start to talk or when someone watches over my shoulders my pencil either stops or I draw meaningless lines.

At the top of the mountain we are all snow leopards.

With the piano I'm completely in control of the gestural situation-not that I'm going to play the piece myself, but I know what's difficult, what's impossible.

Spring comes: the flowers learn their colored shapes.

I do see that there is an argument against suicide: the grief of the worshipers left behind, the awful famine in their hearts, these are too costly terms for the release.

I needed to turn off the negative voice in my head - I was psyching myself out.

Memento mori and obey the Lord. Art and religion love the somber chord.

And I think more than anything else, I know when I go to bed that no one's working harder doing what I'm doing, and I think, quite frankly, simply that hard work at some point was gonna pay off.