Billy Collins Quotes
Quotes to Explore
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The books that the world calls immoral are books that show the world its own shame.
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With the common Iranian threat bringing the Sunni Arab world and Israel closer together, an Israeli-Palestinian peace would go a long way in improving relations and rebuffing Iran's regional ambitions.
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My autobiography is a digressive illustration and exemplification of what race has meant in the world in the 19th and 20th centuries.
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I know how to make a record that commercial radio or Triple J will smash now... It's kind of hard to stay true and write what you would write if you didn't have that in your head. Because I know I can get way more airplay and get this much bigger... and that's what I'm trying to avoid doing. Trying to avoid the poisons of success.
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I don't really read 'business books,' and I didn't think 'The Paradox of Choice' was a business book. I'm very surprised and gratified that the business world thought it was one.
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But I think funny and talent will always win out; I mean, of course there are hurdles, but I think if you're funny you will get over all of that.
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One becomes a grandfather and one sees the world a little differently. Certainly the world becomes a more vulnerable place when one has a grandchild, or now I have two. And I think that possibly there's some tenderness that came out of just time and age and being a parent and grandparent.
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I want to work with the best coaches in the world.
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You don't have to aim to be the best of everything, thinking that one day you're going to be the top of the world; I don't think it exists.
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I got tired of books where the boy is a bit thick and the girl's very clever. Why does it have to such an opposition? Why can't they be like the girls and boys that I know personally, who are equally funny and equally cross? Who get things equally wrong and are equally brave? And make the same mistakes?
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When you tour with a band, you're just out there, and it's just you guys. That's your little universe. If you do a play, it's the same deal. That becomes your world, for the cast and crew.
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My director is usually aware of what works for me and what doesn't. For 'Srimanthudu,' I have to give full credit to director Koratala Sivagaru for handling my character the way he did.
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The reduction in compassion that happens when we're all behind computer screens is not good for the world.
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I really enjoy myself in Norway. Because I had started losing confidence in my ability of what I do. But sometimes, man, you just get tired of fighting and trying to prove yourself.
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I see that already in this present world I am exalted above measure by the Lord. And I was not worthy nor such a one as that he should grant this to me, since I know most surely that poverty and affliction become me better than delights and riches.
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The most beautiful thing in the world is, of course, the world itself.
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Any real virtual reality enthusiast can look back at VR science fiction. It's not about playing games... 'The Matrix,' 'Snow Crash,' all this fiction was not about sitting in a room playing video games. It's about being in a parallel digital world that exists alongside our own, communicating with other people, playing with other people.
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I'm not trying to be a celebrity, Justin Timberlake kinda guy.
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For 8,000 years, we've had lyric poetry; for 400 years we've had the novel: theatre hands its meaning down in text. Let's find a medium whose total, sole responsibility is the world as seen as a form of visual intelligence. Surely, surely, surely the cinema should be that phenomenon.
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But I went to high school in a Portland suburb and went to college here.
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Some people are instantly brilliant. The Kenneth Branaghs of this world are ready-formed actors at 23 - he has used his success in lots of different ways - but there are people out there for whom acting is: 'Ooh, I can get on the telly and be famous.'
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Anytime I was in Memphis with my dad and at the house, I was happy. That was, like, a given. It was what I lived for. And I still feel the same excitement and warmth.
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I became somewhat reclusive during a period of time in the '80s.
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When I write, I'm not trying to be funny. It's the way I look at the world.
