There's no one on the island telling them they're not good enough, so they just go ahead and sing and paint and write.

Compromise is a skill, and like all skills it atrophies from lack of use.

For me, a place unvisited is like an unrequited love. A dull ache that- try as you might to think it away, to convince yourself that she really wasn't the right country for you- just won't leave you in peace.

I've always believed that happiness is just around the corner. The trick is fining the right corner.

Genius is not only a what or a who, it is a where. It is grounded in a place every single time.

..there is more to life than just pleasure. We want to achieve our happiness and not just experience it.

That's why we feel so disoriented, irritated even, when these touchstones from our past are altered. We don't like it when our hometown changes, even in small ways. It's unsettling. The playground! It used to be right here, I swear. Mess with our hometown, and you're messing with our past, with who we are. Nobody likes that.