Born on February 20th

"In the field of motivation & action, do not wait for a clear sky; the most resilient journeys begin in the midst of the storm."

"Success is not a destination of comfort, but the daily practice of stepping into the unknown. As a poet & novelist, this is the foundational truth I have observed."

"Your potential is a fire waiting to be kindled by the friction of consistent effort."

"I think anybody who has been in the theater, prefers it. Television is a... factory. You turn out things on a revolving assembly line. You don't have time to perfect anything in television."

"I've worked with very few that I considered unpleasant. Dennis the Menace was a joy to work on."

"I had admired Richard Burton for years and years before I had ever worked with him. He was a great, great actor. It was a joy to get to know him as a person."

"The last thing in the world I should have done was go into the theater because was inordinately shy as a young man. I couldn't open my mouth. At a party, I was the one stuck up against the wall. I was embarrassed about talking. I felt that I couldn't talk well."

"My voice, I have to say, is kind of miraculous because I was born with a cleft palate."

"My wife and I love to read. We're going to have to move out to make room for the books! And we have our dogs."

"The Beatles were great; we know that. But we were trying to do a new thing. Why do we need to recreate the Sixties?"

"We started out to finish groups like U2 - that was what it was all about."

"I'd like to change the world. Eradicate poverty, racism, and sexism... all the usual things."

"Putting another human being above yourself isn't healthy. I think it's capitalistic."

"One person might perceive me as godlike, and the next might think I'm a northern thug. I don't think I've done myself any favours... but I swear I've not had a proper fight since I was 14."

"I liked him, that Jarvis Cocker. I like the fact he was androgynous, he could appeal to everybody. He wasn't just a lad pretending to be a thug."

"I like a lot of that Chicago stuff, house music."

"Belief outweighs talent. Self-belief's got me everything, self-belief."

"Everything I've ever achieved, I've done on my terms."

"If you want to call me a Karaoke King, I'll take it."

"We're all anti-royalist, anti-patriarch. Cos it's 1989. Time to get real."

"I went into jail with absolutely no respect whatsoever for authority, and I came out with even less."

"Northern soul was huge in Manchester in the '70s and '80s; I went to a lot of all-nighters."

"'Psychedelic' means mind-expanding."

"I'd love to see the world without liquor for a week."

"Getting a grey beard's not cool."

"We're against hypocrisy, lies, bigotry, show business, insincerity, phonies, and fakers."

"At primary school, I thought I was George Best. Then I got to secondary school, and it was more serious."

"With the Stone Roses, I always thought we'd be successful because we had some great songs."

"One thing I've always loved and rated me dad for is that, because of him, I've never seen the Queen's Christmas speech."

"Oasis are okay, but they're like The Sun: base."