We like something because someone else liked it.

I just realized that I never look at a painting and ask, 'Is this painting fictional or non-fictional?' It’s just a painting.

Writing should be like skirts. Long enough to cover what it needs to cover and short enough to maintain interest.

Samuel Clemens isn't Mark Twain. Mark Twain is Mark Twain. He doesn't become the thing until he creates himself.

I have no interest in being a trained ballerina. People should dance how they want to dance. I want to be the funky chicken.

It's like that where these little anecdotes come through, and I guess that's what I like about books like that [He Stopped Loving Her Today]. Fiction now is so experiential.

The things that I have loved have always been those extremes where there has been some kind of apocalypse in the person's life, and they come out unscathed or scathed.

So much of our culture is bought and manufactured - not to say great art can't come out of that. Some art is really amazing that is manufactured and sold, like action movies and stuff.

I guess the things I have always loved are from people who were just being themselves. They were doing these things because they couldn't do it any other way. It was for them.

I think maybe it's my personality. People don't like my face.

It's weird. People want you to know that they write. They want you to know they're a musician, rather than making music or making stories. It's the strangest thing.

Freedom wanders in the landscape of the mind, and nourishes the deepest yearnings of the soul.

Today, I don't believe in destiny. But I do believe in history...There's nothing more powerful than history...

Music moves the body, soul and spirit to the bliss.

We transform our relationships when we listen with our ears, hearts, and souls.

We have to tackle the plague of gun violence.

My horses make very silly faces when I'm preparing their meals.

Any shoe which protects your feet in a hard road is a beautiful shoe!

There is no good way of measuring poverty.

I really believe in trying to increase the amount of useful information in the world and in being accurate in the sense that you can take what I say to the bank, even if you disagree with me.