I disapproved of the fact that the government here refused to adopt the few reforms that Gorbachev put over in the field of media and the field of culture.

I certainly hoped that in the Eastern part of Germany, what was just beginning to be called the German Democratic Republic, you would develop a system of socialism with freedom and democracy.

I was in psychological warfare in World War II, so I know psychological warfare when I see it.

The Wall was the actual symbol of a defeat, of inferiority.

If you live in a system that is suppressive, you don't walk upright, you always go with your head down.

Show me one place where a whole government is concerned with a book of a writer and is concerned enough to suppress it.

A great number of people in the East German parts had been Nazis, so the change of mind was not altogether there.

A foreman in the East wouldn't know how many workers he would have the next day, because part of his working force had left the system to go to West Germany.

We certainly hoped perestroika would win out and that there would be changes. We knew all along that socialism could flourish only with a certain amount of freedom and democracy.

Even in West Germany in the beginning, people wanted a kind of socialism.

I not only saw the possibility of nuclear war, I feared it very much. If they started a military conflagration, it would automatically lead to nuclear warfare.

The very life of any creature is a quick-fading spark in fathomless darkness.

In the faces of men and women I see God.

The bottom line is that time travel is allowed by the laws of physics.

People change their opinion according to your position. And both politicians and bureaucrats begin to take you more seriously, as they suddenly feel you have become more important.

As I am sure you know, when people say 'It's my pleasure,' they usually mean something along the lines of, 'There's nothing on Earth I would rather do less.' [...]

Habitats keep evolving new pageants of species, and we shouldn't interfere.

The only place Avant Garde looks good is in the words Avant Garde.

And I wondered if hurdlers ever thought, you know, 'This would go faster if we just got rid of the hurdles.

There’s no way to succeed in business without the highest ethical standards.

David Mamet, Tim Kazurinsky, and Denise DeClue, who adapted [ About Last Night]. Between the three of them... I mean, it's always down to the writing. You're only as good as your writing.