“I had learned one of the bitter lessons of life: never try to regain the past, the fire will have become ashes.” 

It is fatal to enter any war without the will to win it.

“Psychology is the science of mental life” 

“Oh I can't explain. When I like people immensely I never tell their names to any one. It is like surrendering a part of them. I have grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make modern life mysterious or marvellous to us. The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it.” 

Life is short, but there is always time enough for courtesy.

“Conscience makes egotists of us all.” 

“But youth smiles without any reason. It is one of its chiefest charms.” 

“I'm not black on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, and a woman on Thursday, Friday and Saturday” 

“I’m also now immune to politicians who say, “I’ve traveled the length and breadth of this great land, and I know…” I’ve traveled more than any of them, and I don’t know.” 

“Then, as if in answer to a riddle posed years before, you will realize that this growth came from seeds you planted or watered or carried from place to place—and you’ll be rewarded in the way that we as communal beings need most: you’ll know you made a difference.” 

I admire the work of brilliant actresses such as Judi Dench, Maggie Smith and Helen Mirren, who have had such varied careers. They have never stopped working, and they are as great today as they ever were.

It seems like people increasingly just can't be by themselves because they're so used to having an epicenter on the Internet that actually exists for other people. Until someone clicks onto your Facebook page, it doesn't mean anything.

I'm not particularly interested in playing characters that think the way I do.

Look, it's one of the great mysteries of the world, I cannot answer that question. I think I'm vaguely blonde. To be perfectly frank, I don't know.

If I'm not good at acting, I'm not good at anything else.

I think the downside of the Internet is that speaking-or writing-has become the point in and of itself.

I look at someone's face and I see the work before I see the person. I personally don't think people look better when they do it; they just look different.

“I don't have a sense of entitlement or that I deserve this. You'd be surprised at the lack of competition between nominees - I think a lot of it's imposed from the outside. Can I have my champagne now?”

“faith in the intellect...is the only faith yet sanctioned by its fruits”

“Our occasional madness is less wonderful than our occasional sanity.”

“If time is relative, doing new things actually makes us feel we’ve lived a longer life.” 

“We laughed at the same things, and we liked the same things. What more is needed for agreeable society?”

“The wisest mind hath something yet to learn.”

“Fashion is something barbarous, for it produces innovation without reason and imitation without benefit.”