People are always asking what's the secret of my success, and the answer is easy - at least for me. You have to have a strong inner drive. If you don't have a goal or purpose to strive for, I don't think that you have much of a life. You've got to have something to do that you want to apply yourself to - that's what living is all about.
Cogito cogito ergo cogito sum -- "I think that I think, therefore I think that I am;" as close an approach to certainty as any philosopher has yet made.
I think to make your home as comfortable as possible is so important. There’s something really interesting about that as a trend, that whole idea of lifestyle and being happy in your surroundings.
In terms of my conversations with [Vladimir] Putin, these are conversations that took place before the election. As I indicated, there has been very clear proof that they have engaged in cyber attacks. This isn't new. It's not unique to Russia. There are a number of states where we've seen low-level cyber attacks and industrial espionage and, you know, other behavior that we think should be out of bounds.
I think it was rather an advantage not having any living poets in England or America in whom one took any particular interest. I don't know what it would be like but I think it would be a rather troublesome distraction to have such a lot of dominating presences, as you call them, about. Fortunately we weren't bothered by each other.
I think for Laura [Bush] it was kind of a sense of remorse because she is very close to the girls. They're busy little souls, and so we don't see them as much as we'd like to. But Laura talks to them all the time.
Science was tearing through the 'fine-spun ecclesiastical cobwebs' to behold a new cosmos, in which our Earth is merely an 'eccentric speck' - a world of evolution 'and unchanging causation'. It invited new ways of thinking. It demanded a new rationale for belief. With science's truths the only accessible ones, 'blind faith' was no longer admirable but 'the one unpardonable sin'.
.. if you asked most people whether they believed in love or not, they’d probably say they didn’t. Yet that’s not necessarily what they truly think. It’s just the way they defend themselves against what they want. They believe in it, but pretend they don’t until they’re allowed to. Most people would throw away all their cynicism if they could. The majority just never gets the chance.
I think the difficult thing is the transition between TV competition series and going into the actual music industry. There still seems to be a slight disconnect there.
We all belong to the nasty stinking little human race, & of course it is not nice for God's beloved vermin to scoff at each other... Oh, we are a nasty little lot-& to think there are people who would like to save us & continue us. It won't happen if I have any influence.