I think we continually need to understand how important an event the war was - how defining, how central to who we are. Everything that came before it led up to it, and everything of importance to this country - at least up to 1940 - was a consequence of it. Even now there's an echo of the war, however faint, in almost everyone's life.

I subscribe to William Faulkner's' view that history is not just about what we were before but who we are now.

The only art form that Americans have created that's recognized around the world is jazz music born in a community that had the peculiar experience of being unfree in a free land.

The genius of our country is improvisation, and jazz reflects that. It's our great contribution to the arts.

History is malleable. A new cache of diaries can shed new light, and archeological evidence can challenge our popular assumptions.

Do something that will last and be beautiful. It doesn't have to be a bridge-or a symphony or book or a business. It could be the look in the eye of a child you raise or a simple garden you tend. Do something that will last and be beautiful.

It is the great arrogance of the present to forget the intelligence of the past