That’s why; he’s worried about how his life is turning out, and he’s lonely, and lonely people are the bitterest of them all

You know that things aren't going well for you when you can't even tell people the simplest fact about your life, just because they'll presume you're asking them to feel sorry for you.

The truth about life was that nothing ever ended until you died, and even then you just left a whole bunch of unresolved narratives behind you.

It's just that none of us had the wit or talent to make them into songs. We made them into life, which much messier, and more time consuming, and leaves nothing for anybody to whistle.

It struck him that how you spent Christmas was a message to the world about where you were in life, some indication of how deep a hole you had managed to burrow for yourself

...I feel as though I made a face and the wind changed, and now I have to go through life grimacing in this horrible way.

I never share credit or desserts.

Why let one high C ruin your whole evening?

There were times in my career ... when I felt like a trapeze artist doing dangerous somersaults without a net underneath. When you execute those somersaults flawlessly, the audience feels the same sense of triumph the performer does.

In youth we run into difficulties. In old age difficulties run into us.

“She needed him. And he was nowhere to be found. There was no else she could rely on. No one like her brother. No one else at all.”

“No, but your idea of what betters human life might differ from someone else’s.’ For”

He leaves and she thinks for the hundredth time that in their emotional life all these intelligent men use a level so much lower than anything they use for work, that they might be different creatures.

...She thinks, for the hundredth time, that in their emotional life all these intelligent men use a level so much lower than anything they use for work, that they might be different creatures.

...We try to have things both ways. We’ve always refused to live by the book and the rule; but then why start worrying because the world doesn’t treat us by rule?

I hated the 1960's feminists," she says. "They were dogmatists, you see. In comes ideology, and out goes common sense. This is my experience of life.

All the adversity I've had in my life, all my troubles and obstacles, have strengthened me... You may not realize it when it happens, but a kick in the teeth may be the best thing in the world for you.

I always like to look on the optimistic side of life, but I am realistic enough to know that life is a complex matter.

I'd say it's been my biggest problem all my life... it's money. It takes a lot of money to make these dreams come true.

I have been up against tough competition all my life. I wouldn't know how to get along without it.

“Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.”

Whenever I walk out on a stage, I'm begging for affection.

Maybe subconsciously I feel I was meant to work hard for a living.

I do think that same gender partners should be able to be married. Why not? If you share a life together than who in the world should have anything to say about it?