Los Angeles was an impression of failure, of disappointment, of despair, and of oddly makeshift lives. This is California? I thought.

Making cartoons means very hard work at every step of the way, but creating a successful cartoon character is the hardest work of all.

Faced with the choice of enduring a bad toothache or going to the dentist, we generally tried to ride out the bad tooth.

I cannot say who, precisely, came up with the idea of a Stone Age family.

That's what keeps me going: dreaming, inventing, then hoping and dreaming some more in order to keep dreaming.

My marriage had been impulsive. That marriage should have been short-lived instead of the 23 years it spanned.

I learned long ago to accept the fact that not everything I create will see the light of day.

In those days, boxing was very glamorous and romantic. You listened to fights on the radio, and a good announcer made it seem like a contest between gladiators.

I never got tired of Tom and Jerry, but I did have a dream of doing more with my life than making cartoons.

Creating fantasy is a very personal thing, but you can't take the process too personally.

My last days at MGM were like the fall of the Roman Empire in fast motion.

Dwelling on the past is like dragging a boat over dry land.

your facethrough the blurred visionof my disillusioned eyesmergeswith the rest of them.

I want people to understand there is a such a thing as creating a harmonious experience between the dogs and the humans.

Real tragedy is never resolved. It goes on hopelessly for ever.

Played tennis for years. But you can't improve at tennis after you're 50. You get to be in your 40s, and suddenly you're a doubles player.

Androgyny is not trying to manage the relationship between the opposites; it is simply flowing between them.

For at the center of all spiritual traditions is the beacon of a truly radical proposal: Open your heart to everybody. Everybody.

I have always wanted to midcourse-correct (or undermine) in a poem, and let that be the turn. That poem is to do with displacement, with almosts - even the rhymes are intentionally off.

If you don't work, you shouldn't have an income. If you don't work, you shouldn't get paid.

Political leaders have to withstand headwinds.