Maybe it takes forty years of your life to understand how the world seems to work.
There is no merit to discipline under ideal circumstances. I must have it in the face of death or it is worthless.
There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that "my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.
Any book worth banning is a book worth reading.
At odd and unpredictable times, we cling in fright to the past.
The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.
I made up my mind long ago to follow one cardinal rule in all my writing-to be clear. I have given up all thought of writing poetically or symbolically or experimentally, or in any of the other modes that might (if I were good enough) get me a Pulitzer prize. I would write merely clearly and in this way establish a warm relationship between myself and my readers, and the professional critics-Well, they can do whatever they wish.
My school of thought is, anything goes, but I can't do that anymore.
I consider that it is on instruction and education that the future security and direction of the destiny of every nation chiefly and fundamentally rests.
My first acting class was taught by a little known playwright, David Mamet, who then cast me in my first play, opposite John Malkovich.
If you look around at the people in show business today they are basically the people who didn't give up.