It is impossible to experience one's death objectively and still carry a tune.

I was thrown out of college for cheating on the metaphysics exam; I looked into the soul of the boy sitting next to me.

The only thing that does change, to some degree, is [that] you have some life experiences, you suffer a certain amount and you incorporate that into your work. Not in the content of your work, but in the sensibility of your work. It's nothing that you try and do; it just happens. And if you're lucky, people buy tickets to see it, and if you're not lucky, [then] they don't like it. But that's all.

He was so depressed, he tried to commit suicide by inhaling next to an Armenian.

I would not like to live in the past because you don't get anesthetic when you go to the dentist. You don't get antibiotics. You don't get the things that you are used to now, cell phones and televisions and things that are very convenient. You don't want that. But, it would be fun if you could, every now and then, just meet a friend for lunch at Maxim's in Paris in 1900, or go back to 1870 just for a couple of hours, take a walk in the park, and then come right back to Broadway.

None of the arts are any good unless you really are great at them.

I believe people ought to mate for life...like pigeons or Catholics.