If you join government, calmly make your contribution and move on. Don't go along to get along; do your best and when you have to-...-and you will--leave, and be something else.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Beware the politically obsessed. They are often bright and interesting, but they have something missing in their natures; there is... a hole, an empty place, and they use politics to fill it up. It leaves them somehow misshapen.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Great speeches have always had great soundbites. The problem now is that the young technicians who put together speeches are payin...g attention only to the soundbite, not to the text as a whole, not realizing that all great soundbites happen by accident, which is to say, all great soundbites are yielded up inevitably, as part of the natural expression of the text. They are part of the tapestry, they aren't a little flower somebody sewed on.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
The Irish are often nervous about having the appropriate face for the occasion. They have to be happy at weddings, which is a stra...in, so they get depressed; they have to be sad at funerals, which is easy, so they get happy.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
I love eulogies. They are the most moving kind of speech because they attempt to pluck meaning from the fog, and on short order, w...hen the emotions are still ragged and raw and susceptible to leaps.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
Most people aren't appreciated enough, and the bravest things we do in our lives are usually known only to ourselves. No one throw...s ticker tape on the man who chose to be faithful to his wife, on the lawyer who didn't take the drug money, or the daughter who held her tongue again and again. All this anonymous heroism.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »
A speech is poetry: cadence, rhythm, imagery, sweep! A speech reminds us that words, like children, have the power to make dance t...he dullest beanbag of a heart.LESSATTRIBUTION DETAIL »