Live action writers will give you a structure, but who the hell is talking about structure? Animation is closer to jazz than some kind of classical stage structure.

What's most important in animation is the emotions and the ideas being portrayed. I'm a great believer of energy and emotion.

Animation is tremendously resilient. Animation will recover, as art always recovers. There's always cycles of good art.

As an artist, I want to interpret my feelings - not run across the street and ask what my mother thinks.

As an artist, I want to interpret my feelings

I would like to have the original ending to my Lord of the Rings instead of the one they released. In my original cut I had the victory at Helm's Deep as the final sequence.

Disney had such a hold on the mind of America-they were Adolf Hitler. The whole country thought Disney was some sort of god and that animation was some sort of pure thing for children.

Look what Disney's done to their animation department. There wasn't an animator in charge of their animation unit!

All the old great companies were run by guys who knew what an animator meant, and guys who knew how to draw. All the companies today are run by executives.

The rise of anime had to happen. If the Japanese could tell better American stories, it would go through the roof. They still tell stories which are very much oriental. I take my hat off to them.

I draw what I feel, which is no more than doing my job.

Home is where your books are.

If you want to connect with people who are in distress and great grief and scared, you need to do it in a certain way. I move kind of slow. I talk kind of slow. I let them know that I respect them.

A lot of local food is very tasty. I'm very happy to eat it. I just don't think it's the same thing as saving the world.

You can't measure manhood with a tape line around the biceps.

I used to get stressed out, but my cancer has put everything into perspective.

You were never poor as long as you had something to love.

To a rational being it is the same thing to act according to nature and according to reason.

I haven't been abroad in so long that I almost speak English without an accent now.

Grace is God's love in action for those who don't deserve it.

We should not permit prayer to be taken out of the schools; that's the only way most of us got through.