Fiction's essential activity is to imagine how others feel, what a Saturday afternoon in an

Italian town in the 2nd Century looked like. My ambition is solely to get some effect, as of light on stone in a forest on a September day.
Guy Davenport

There's a huge latent market for software development that's just flat-out honest.
Kent Beck

I don't think a reporter necessarily becomes an arm of law enforcement. I think a reporter is like any other citizen. If a citizen can do his or her duty as a witness, if they have information about a crime, or if they have information about a criminal group, I think that there's a duty on the part of the citizen.
Edwin Meese

The notion of the infinite variety of detail and the multiplicity of forms is a pleasing one; in complexity are the fringes of beauty, and in variety are generosity and exuberance.
Annie Dillard

I am fortunate that I get sent scripts and get to meet people I would never have met had I not done 'Harry Potter.' But I feel I had to come out of that show and prove that I am not a one trick pony and can do other stuff.
Matthew Lewis

I've done all these historical epics and chivalrous roles, but there's an odder, quirkier side to me that nobody knows about.
Orlando Bloom

You always want to come back with an image that's interesting visually, and you hope to get something from the person you photograph that's different than other images you know of these people.
Anton Corbijn

I teach a lecture course on American poetry to as many as 150 students. For a lot of them, it's their only elective, so this is their one shot. They'll take the Russian Novel or American Poetry, so I want to give them the high points, the inescapable poets.
Robert Hass

I try not to put messages in my songs. My only message is man's communication with his fellow man. I want to narrow the gap of strangeness and alienation.
Rod McKuen

My parents were both storytellers. They always spoke with metaphorical richness.
Alice Walker

Don't ever criticize yourself. Don't go around all day long thinking, 'I'm unattractive, I'm slow, I'm not as smart as my brother.' God wasn't having a bad day when he made you... If you don't love yourself in the right way, you can't love your neighbour. You can't be as good as you are supposed to be.
Joel Osteen

Gemeoss

This battle for 'common-sense' gun control laws pits emotion and passion against logic and reason.

All too often in such a contest, logic loses. So, expect more meaningless, if not harmful, 'gun control' legislation. Good news - if you're a crook. Larry Elder I drive a lot. Just for pleasure. Sometimes I'll get in the Cadillac and drive around the city or the country, kind of trying to get lost basically. Y'know, just see where roads lead. Frank Black You and I will meet again, When we're least expecting it, One day in some far off place, I will recognize your face, I won't say goodbye my friend, For you and I will meet again. Tom Petty We must dare to think 'unthinkable' thoughts. We must learn to explore all the options and possibilities that confront us in a complex and rapidly changing world. J. William Fulbright Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose - a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye. Mary Shelley Never make friends with people who are above or below you in status. Such fr...

We hope and we've made clear that the forces need to come out. It needs

to be full and complete withdrawal. Our position is it needs to be done as soon as possible so that the elections can be free, fair and free of outside influence. Stephen Hadley Parks said, he's guilty and that's the end of the story. Tommy Bond We know that the nature of genius is to provide idiots with ideas twenty years later. Louis Aragon Welcome to the Salvation Army. I've never been associated with an offense so nice about giving the ball away. Hayden Fry I am certain of nothing but the holiness of the heart's affections, and the truth of imagination. John Keats Russia has gone through eight years of continuing economic pain. Jeffrey Sachs It's nice to get a response from the artists that I cover. Joe Cocker

If you're poor, you don't often live near a good school. If it's a competitive

public school program, our kids are not prepared to enter those programs. Sonia Sotomayor I'm a middle-class, middle-brow novelist. And that's it. It amuses me. Anita Brookner I have always had a very natural connection to the water, and that connection stems from the ocean itself. Aaron Peirsol I got married at a very young age, and of course, for all the wrong reasons, and ended up divorced and lost everything. It was a very difficult time in my life. Willie Aames We have 11 great potato flavors, and customers have been clamoring for tortilla. For over a year, we worked to develop the four flavors of tortilla popchips: chili limon, nacho cheese, ranch and salsa. They're made with traditional stoneground masa, are gluten-free, and have less than half the fat of other chips. Keith Belling I never won anything by myself. I was always strong because of help that gave me extra strength to win. Dan Gable There's a toxicity within gaming culture, and also i...

A high nutrient density diet was associated with more feelings of hunger in the mouth

and throat and less in the head and stomach. Joel Fuhrman I may not be where I want to be, but thank God I am not where I used to be. Joyce Meyer When a car's ahead of you, as long as you can see it, you get a tow, just like the draft in NASCAR. Even if it's a long ways down the track, it punches a hole in the air that has to help. When you're running alone, you can feel the difference, and it shows on the clock, too. Mario Andretti The United States created the best popular songs that were ever written, and from the 1920s to the 1940s, it was a renaissance period. It stopped in 1950. Tony Bennett The film I like the best is always the one I'm working on now or next. Ewan McGregor When I have a little down time, I like to go to the gym and try to bank some hours there. I like to spend time with my dogs, go hiking, do a little traveling. Emmanuelle Vaugier When I was in Mexico and started to dream in Spanish, I knew that was a good sign that I was learn...

With hacky sack, somebody brought one to recess in sixth grade and it kind of

all went downhill from there! The same with the yoyo's! One kid brought a yoyo one day and people started getting them. I just kept at it and found that I really loved it. Jason Dolley Shooting movies has changed, and me too - I have changed. And then, every film I do, something in my mind, my soul, changes. My natural change, I change at the same time as the films, I think. Dario Argento It's different as a guest as opposed to being a star of a series. A guest star is a whole different responsibility. It's much different than being a regular. You come in, and it's a lot of unfamiliar faces, and you want to try to fit in as best you can, but also you want to stay there without making waves. Donnie Wahlberg I like to focus on making the music sound simple and true, and very lush and full. I think music should take you to somewhere else where you have the space to contemplate or exercise your imagination. All the while you should be feeling real good, like when y...

The future of the television industry is changing at an unstoppable rate, and it is

exciting to share my experience and thoughts on how this will change the value of content in the digital space. Dana Brunetti I did a pilot for Fox years ago called 'Faceless,' with Sean Bean. I always thought it was such a cool show because it was really raw. I thought we were pushing it. This was back at a time before there was the 'cable standard.' Joe Carnahan I wear two hats. The one is business and increasing my shareholders' value; the other is social responsibility. Guler Sabanci Analysis of soil, grave goods and skeletons has been key to our understanding of archaeology and the migration of peoples, as well as their daily lives. But in mainstream history, we tend to stick to documents. Kate Williams If the nation is rich but people are poor, the country cannot be strong, and society will be unstable. Zong Qinghou I was undeterred by the danger of traveling as a single American woman through Taliban-governed land. I believed in the stories I w...

If you're going out for a meal with friends, and they say they can't afford

to go to such and such a place, you can't force them to afford it. Phyllis Logan When people go to rehab and come out, they go through a difficult period, but I never had that. Elton John When I got a call to do the voice of Johnny in an episode of 'American Dad' titled 'I Can't Stan You,' it was a great opportunity to be a part of a really funny cutting-edge show on television. I really got into the character, and I was able to do some improvisation, which allowed me to mix in part of my personality into the script. Paul Butcher When you're in a crisis of, you know, tremendous proportions, it's beyond any human capability to control, you just make the best decisions you can, and you just hope that your intuition is correct. Rudy Giuliani I have no ethics when it comes to art. You just do what you can to make it as beautiful as you can. James Mercer In elementary school, I loved the 'Bailey School Kids' series. It was about a group...

The public wouldn't like the perfect umpire in every game. It would kill off baseball's

greatest alibi - 'We was robbed.' Billy Evans I suspect that here theists and atheists would agree: Human beings have within them the ability to choose evil or good. We wake up each day facing the age-old struggle of good and evil. In some situations, mental illness clouds our judgment. Adam Hamilton I go through periods where I don't shop at all, and then I go crazy and buy everything in sight. I never know what to wear, and I'm at my worst before an audition. I pull everything out of the closet, throw it on my bed. I'll get entirely dressed and then take it all off again until I'm in a kind of frenzy. Brooke Adams Why did mainstream America come to accept marriage equality? Gay leaders had made a convincing case that gay families were like straight families and should have the same rights. The American spirit of fair play had been invoked. Edmund White When I hear a great country song, I get chills and I want to cry. You feel something. And just so...

If you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge

of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and forever upward, then you won't see why we go. Edmund Hillary I'm not the first to admit that raising a child in Park Slope, Brooklyn, can bear an embarrassing resemblance to the TV show 'Portlandia.' My wife and I try to have some ironic distance from the culture of organic, chemical-free parenting, but we're often participants. Adam Davidson When you have a voice, and you have an opportunity at the world level to be able to speak, it has to be right. Caitlyn Jenner The Chinese, as befits a Communist autocracy, approached the task of dominating the Olympics with top-down military discipline. Shashi Tharoor My mother wouldn't allow me to speak slang when I was growing up. But when I got outside, around my friends, it was 'Yo' and 'That's the joint' and 'Yo, what's up?' So I had my game for my friends and my game for my ...

My hunch is that people often affiliate with causes online for selfish and narcissistic purposes.

Sometimes, it may be as simple as trying to impress their online friends, and once you have fashioned that identity, there is very little reason to actually do anything else. Evgeny Morozov The App Store has democratized the creation of content. As a 12-year-old kid, I was able to put my application on the store. No one knows who's behind the screen so you can't tell I'm a 12-year-old. Nick D'Aloisio It is one of the more striking generalizations of biochemistry - which surprisingly is hardly ever mentioned in the biochemical textbooks - that the twenty amino acids and the four bases, are, with minor reservations, the same throughout Nature. Francis Crick Why is it that our young kids all across America can solve the most complex problems in a video game involving executive decision making and analytical thinking, yet we accept the fact that they can't add or read? Naveen Jain I care so passionately about improving the quality of life for women and girls...