Quotes About Influence

If millions of Americans choose to weigh in on the outcome of 'American Idol' through text messages and the Web, then why not harness similar technological tools to encourage discourse on the political landscape?

If you can be a good example to other people, why not try to be that person? I have a bit of a people pleaser in me, but not so much so that it's out of control.

Romance readers love a wealthy hero, and why not? There's value in a man able to hire a helicopter, a coach and six horses, or a collection of werewolves to do his bidding - and the bidding of the lucky woman on his arm.

It's our job as fiction writers to provide a delight that nothing else can - to such a degree that people have no choice but to read our work. Now that's a very tall order, if not impossible. But why not try?

People pay attention to artists and celebrities, so they have the opportunity to do something great with this limelight. I, for one, have no problem with Kanye running for president, because if it's something that he truly believes in and it can lead to greater good, why not? I'm all for that.

I am constantly visible in TV shows because anybody who is thinking of a role sees me performing on TV and may say, 'Why not him?' That way I am always in the limelight. It's better than running around for good roles. I can't lobby for roles.

If someone wants to offer me some money to talk about something that I feel strongly about on Twitter - and I don't feel it's diminishing in any way my messages - I don't see why not.

If you're gonna steal from somebody, why not Shakespeare?

With shows like 'Made In Chelsea,' we all know what they're doing is rehearsed. So why not have an audience phone-in element? They can make the decision on what they're going to argue about.

A return to first principles in a republic is sometimes caused by the simple virtues of one man. His good example has such an influence that the good men strive to imitate him, and the wicked are ashamed to lead a life so contrary to his example.

Diplomacy means all the wicked devices of the Old World, spheres of influence, balances of power, secret treaties, triple alliances, and, during the interim period, appeasement of Fascism.

Jane was my wicked stepmother: she was generous, affectionate and resourceful; she salvaged my schooling and I owe her an unknowable debt for that. One flaw: sometimes, early on, she would tell me things designed to make me think less of my mother, and I would wave her away, saying, 'Jane, this just backfires and makes me think less of you.'

If L. Frank Baum had written 'Wicked,' I'd have done. It doesn't appeal to me at all and never did.

Guerillas' uses a snippet of 'Procreation of the Wicked' by Celtic Frost because I always loved that song.

Human blunders usually do more to shape history than human wickedness.

It is a fact that cannot be denied: the wickedness of others becomes our own wickedness because it kindles something evil in our own hearts.

I took the first James Kelman novel, 'The Bus Conductor Hines', home to my dad. I thought, 'My dad will like this; it's written in Scots.' But my dad said: 'I can't read that.' He was reading James Bond and John le Carre. That was part of what attracted me to crime - the idea of getting a wide audience.

There was this girl who went to my school, and she did a Nikki Giovanni poem, 'Ego Tripping,' and it was just different from everyone else's. It wasn't flat recitation. It had an energy and a life to it. And it made me sit up in my seat, and my eyes got wide, and I really felt inside myself, 'She's making me feel things. I want to do that.'

I definitely want make an impact in television. I want to make a continued and greater impact in feature films, and I want to be somebody who continues to be at the forefront of creating a wide variety of content that I could be proud of and that engages people on all levels.

My drummer, Gene Lake, is Oliver Lake's son. So I certainly have wide tastes, in not only what I listen to, but what I play as well.

I don't know what politicians are like, but I imagine, having played one, that you have to have a really wide view of the world. You have to think globally; you can't think small.

To this day I get mail from women who say, I went to law school because of your song. But I would hate to think out of the wide spectrum of things I have done in my career, that's all I would be remembered for.

'The Dante Club' was one of America's most important book clubs, as their Wednesday night meetings ultimately led to our country's first exposure to Dante's poetry on a wide scale.

In the district of Hizan, through the influence of Shaikh Abdurrahman Tagi, known as Seyda, so many students, teachers, and scholars emerged, I was sure all Kurdistan took pride in them and their scholarly debates and wide knowledge and Sufi way. These were the people who would conquer the face of the earth!