What would be left of our tragedies if an insect were to present us his?

Human life is a combination of tragedy and comedy. The shapes and designs that surround us are the music accompanying this tragedy and this comedy.

It is selfish to concern oneself with tragedies.

The Village Voice gave me an outlet. They encouraged writers to publish idiosyncratic, intellectually ambitious journalism in voices that ranged from demonic to highfalutin. And they paid me well once the magazine was unionized. Getting paid is motivational.

This enraged the other Nazi so much that the next morning he came to our house and he shot my father.

My natural state is to be happy. I'm naturally buoyant. I wake up feeling, 'What a great morning!' I've had some tragedy in my life, absolutely, but I don't know one human being who hasn't. You either learn from it and become empowered by it, or you become a victim to it. It's life, after all.

I played with dolls until I was 15. My mother encouraged it because my older sister got married when she was 15, so Mom thought that the longer I stayed with dolls, the better.

My parents split up when I was young, and I was living with my mom for a little while, then I was kind of just on my own really young. It wasn't some kind of global tragedy, it was just never really a very close-knit family. So there was support in the sense that they didn't stand in my way.

No man has the right to dictate what other men should perceive, create or produce, but all should be encouraged to reveal themselves, their perceptions and emotions, and to build confidence in the creative spirit.

Medical engineering is one of the areas in which the traditional 'silo' structures of university disciplines have not encouraged collaboration.

I love John Irving's stuff. It's that marriage of comedy and tragedy. It's really terrific.

Saab never asked me to give up my career. In fact, he encouraged me to continue acting after marriage. But, after a while, my heart was not in my career. I just wanted to take care of Saab.

I did know Ted Hughes and I partly wrote the book to explain to myself and others the complexities of a marriage that was for six years wonderfully productive of poetry and then ended in tragedy.

We want our marriage to be a triumph, not a tragedy.

When you encourage others, you in the process are encouraged because you're making a commitment and difference in that person's life. Encouragement really does make a difference.

There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.

Life is a tragedy when seen in close-up, but a comedy in long-shot.

Life is a dream for the wise, a game for the fool, a comedy for the rich, a tragedy for the poor.

Some of the worst racist tragedies in history have been perfectly legal.

I didn't start writing songs, honestly, until I started making my album. I was always doing poetry, but I never thought I could write songs. I discouraged myself and thought it was so hard. But starting this process and learning just what it is to be a songwriter and performer taught me that you don't have to feel discouraged about anything.

I would say that one of the things that encouraged me so much when I became elected to the leadership was the letters I received from fathers of daughters, saying that, 'My daughter can now do many more things because of what you did.'

For 500 years after Gutenberg, the dominant form of information was the printed page: knowledge was primarily delivered in a fixed format, one that encouraged readers to believe in stable and settled truths.

Religion can make it worse. Are you supposing that if people were encouraged to believe in a transcendent reality, and to be encouraged by grand rituals and music and preaching, to love their neighbors, then they would put jealousy and frustration aside?

I often wonder if I should adopt a cause to call my own or start tweeting inspirational messages. And when tragedy strikes and the world takes to social media, is it now my responsibility to respond with #RIPs and #prayfors?