When people are intimidated about having their own opinions, oppression is at hand.
To gain freedom is to gain simplicity.
You can look at a picture for a week and never think of it again. You can also look at the picture for a second and think of it all your life.
The painting rises from the brushstrokes as a poem rises from the words. The meaning comes later.
A simple line painted with the brush can lead to freedom and happiness.
If you have any notion of where you are going, you will never get anywhere.
More important than a work of art itself is what it will sow. Art can die, a painting can disappear. What counts is the seed.
The essay is a wonderful medium. I might mention that some writers who longed to be novelists were better as essayists: Sontag, Baldwin, Vidal, Mary McCarthy, Mailer.
In the absence of sound oversight,responsible businesses are forced to compete against unscrupulous and underhanded businesses, who are unencumbered by any restrictions on activities that might harm the environment, or take advantage of middle-class families, or threaten to bring down the entire financial system.
But a piece of paper can be a powerful presence. I have always had enormous respect for the written word and invariably find a letter more revealing than a face-to-face conversation. In a strange way I suspect I will get to know you better at a distance than I would if you had stayed at home.
You beat 50 percent of the people in America by working hard. You beat 40 percent by being a person of honesty and integrity and standing for something. The last 10 percent is a dogfight in the free enterprise system.