An artist's only concern is to shoot for some kind of perfection, and on his own terms, not anyone else's.

Always, always, always referring every goddam thing that happens right back to our lousy little egos.

The thing with kids is, if they want to grab for the gold ring, you have to let them do it, and not say anything. If they fall off, they fall off, but it's bad if you say anything.

You know Sven? The man who takes care of the gym?' he asked. He waited till he got a nod from Nicholson. 'Well, if Sven dreamed tonight that his dog died, he'd have a very, very bad night's sleep, because he's very fond of that dog. But when he woke up in the morning, everything would be all right. He'd know it was only a dream.' Nicholson nodded. 'What's the point exactly?' The point is if his dog really died, it would be exactly the same thing. Only he wouldn't know it. I mean he wouldn't wake up till he died himself.

For a psychoanalyst to be any good... he'd have to believe that it was through the grace of God that he'd been inspired to study psychoanalysis in the first place.

What I think is, you're supposed to leave somebody alone if he's at least being interesting and he's getting all excited about something. I like it when somebody gets excited about something. It's nice.

Liberate yourself from my vice-like grip!