Sometimes [genius] is just the thing that emerges after twenty years of working at your kitchen table.

[Norden] said, with the Mark 15 Norden bombsight, he could drop a bomb into a pickle barrel at 20,000 feet.

I've been in auditions without screens, and I can assure you that I was prejudiced. I began to listen with my eyes, and there is no way that your eyes don't affect your judgement. The only true way to listen is with your ears and your heart. (p.251)

If people disobey, don't ask what is wrong with them, ask what's wrong with their leaders.

I'm in the storytelling business, and so you're always drawn to the unusual. And early on, I discovered that's the easiest way to tell stories... If you come up through a newspaper as I did, your whole goal is to get a story on the front page, and you only get something on the front page if it's unusual.

People can't do much about the fate part, but we can certainly do a lot about the man part.

Success is a function of persistence and doggedness and the willingness to work hard.