In the second part of life you get rid of stuff you've accumulated.

Your body actually reminds you about your age and your injuries - the body has a stronger memory than your mind.

You cannot be happy with your family while being personally unhappy with your work. It's a Catch-22 kind of thing.

I kind of lost interest in the classical dance. I was very much interested in the modern choreography.

I have been very lucky to work in so many new ballets, but that is what a dancer's work is.

I'm a product of Russian culture, but I never felt it was my country.

My life has been immensely enriched by gay mentors, colleagues and friends, and any discrimination and persecution of gay people is unacceptable.

Every ballet, whether or not successful artistically or with the public, has given me something important.

You open a section of 'The New York Times,' and there's a review or a story on a choreographer or a dancer, and there's an informative, clear image of a dancer. This is, in my view, not an interesting photograph.

I spend at least a couple hours a day in the studio, every day, whether I'm dancing or not.

I like to go to anybody else's birthday, and if I'm invited I'm a good guest. But I never celebrate my birthdays. I really don't care.

In any art form, in Hollywood or in music, there is a handful of people who really, you know, move the envelope.

I go a lot to see young people downtown in little theaters. It's great. If you start somebody's career, it's so exciting.

I read Russian literature a lot.

Everything I do, it's a bit painterly. I like being surrounded by objects, mostly on paper. I like the images. I like the painting. I like good photography. It's something that makes me an emotional connection, and I feel comfortable around it.

Working is living to me.

I don't drink milk, and I don't eat bread, pasta or rice. But I eat a lot of meat, chicken, fish and salads.

I was not extremely patriotic about Mother Russia. I played their game, pretending. You have to deal with, you know, party people, KGB. Horrifying.

I'm an impatient person in many respects. I like to put myself in uncomfortable situations. It forces me to deliver.

To walk across the street is a risk.

Creative Artists Agency put together a project of extraordinary mediocrity and colossal stupidity. Otherwise, it was great.

Astaire was not a sexual animal, but he made his partners look so extraordinarily related to him.

I really reject that kind of comparison that says, Oh, he is the best. This is the second best. There is no such thing.

I get speeding ticket like everybody else. If the restaurant is full I'm waiting in line like everybody else.

To achieve some depth in your field requires a lot of sacrifices. Want to or not, you're thinking about what you're doing in life-in my case, dancing.

I cannot belong to a nonprofit organization because when you receive grants, you have to make such great compromises with your artistic plans.

I am not the first straight dancer or the last.

It's weird when you see pieces of choreography that were done for you 15 or 20 years ago and now they are being done by another dance company.

In '74 it was really a very gloomy atmosphere, I would say, to put it mildly.

I was very restless. I really wanted to be a part of a kind of a progressive society. I was fed up with these Communist doctrines and you were hassled all the time with members of the Party committee who were KGB, what you have to do, where in the West you can go or not to go.

My father was a Party member and he was a pretty high rank military officer under the colonel, junior colonel, I don't know the term. He was a total Stalinist. A bit with a streak of anti-Semitism and very shrewd man, a very kind of nervous man.

Running a company is pretty demanding.

Obviously, the young dancers lack a certain air of maturity.

I am teaching more. That is what I do best.

I have made mistakes.

I don't want to do anything Freudian.

Your heart is very much connected to your mind.

I miss horribly those couple of hours before the performance when you get into the theater and you see people.

Dances have a second and third life. You feel they are never ready. They always have a chance for another life.

My mother had a son from previous marriage and her husband died in Second World War.

I have the life of seven cats.

I've been hurt quite a few times.

I am not trying to do material which I cannot do full out.

I would like to go and dance in Palestine one day, with great pleasure, great pleasure.

I've always said, 'I am a selector, I am not defector' - the first few phrases in English I learned. I said I hate 'defector'; something defective about the people. It's a bad word.

A country like Belgium, or socialist countries in central Europe spend more money on art education than the United States, which is a really puzzling thought.

I never liked dance photography; it's very flat, and dance photography in the studio looks very contrived.

I was always interested in photography and other forms of art.

I don't go to a gym, I don't do yoga. I don't do personal training.

When I'm alone, I work sometimes with music, sometimes without and sometimes just listening to NPR.