Charlie Chaplin: 'This is an emotional moment for me', Lifetime Achievement Award, Academy Awards - 1972

10 April 1972, Los Angeles, USA

Oh, thank you so much. This is an emotional moment for me, and words seem so futile, so feeble. I can only say thank you for the honor of inviting me here. And you're wonderful, sweet people. Thank you.

Lupita Nyong'o: 'I’m certain that the dead are standing about you and watching', Best Supporting Actor Oscar - 2014

11 March 2014, Los Angeles, USA

It doesn’t escape me for one moment that so much joy in my life is thanks to so much pain in someone else’s. And so I want to salute the spirit of Patsey for her guidance. And for Solomon, thank you for telling her story and your own. Steve McQueen, you charge everything you fashion with a breath of your own spirit. Thank you so much for putting me in this position. This has been the joy of my life. I’m certain that the dead are standing about you and watching and they are grateful and so am I.

Chiwetel, thank you for your fearlessness and how deeply you went into telling Solomon’s story. Michael Fassbender, thank you so much. You were my rock. Alfre and Sarah, it was a thrill to work with you. Joe Walker, the invisible performer in the editing room, thank you. Sean Bobbitt, Kalaadevi, Adruitha, Patty Norris, thank you, thank you, thank you, I could not be here without your work.

I want to thank my family for your training and the Yale School of Drama as well for your training. My friends, the Wilsons, this one’s for you. My brother, Junior, sitting by my side. Thank you so much. You are my best friend. And Ben, my other best friend, my chosen family.

When I look down at this golden statue, may it remind me and every little child that no matter where you’re from your dreams are valid.

Thank you.

Matthew McConaughey: 'That keeps me with someone to keep on chasing', Best Actor Oscar - 2014

2 March 2014, Los Angeles, USA

Thank you -- all of these performances were impeccable. In my opinion I didn't see a false note anywhere. I want to thank Jean-Marc Vallee our director. I want to thank Jared Leto and Jennifer Garner who I worked with daily.

There are three things that I need each day. One, I need something to look up to, another to look forward to, and another is someone to chase.

First off, I want to thank God because that's who I look up. He's graced my life with opportunities that I know are not of my hand or of any other hand. He's shown me that it's a scientific fact that gratitude reciprocates. In the words of the late Charlie Laughton, who said, ‘When you got God you got a friend and that friend is you.'

To my family is to what I look forward to. To my father who I know is up there right now with a big pot of gumbo, he has a big lemon meringue pie over there. He's probably in his underwear and has a big can of Miller Lite and he's dancing right now. To you dad, you taught me how to be a man.

To my mother who's here tonight, who taught me and my two older brothers -- demanded -- that we respect ourselves. And in turn we learned we were better able to learn how to respect others. Thank you for that mama.

To my wife, Camilla, and my kids Levi, Vida and Mr Stone (Livingstone), the courage you give me every time I walk through the door is unparallelled. You are the four people in my life that I want to make the most proud of me. Thank you.

And to my hero. That's who I chase. When I was 15 years old I had a very important person in my life come and ask me 'Who's your hero?' I said, 'I thought about it and it's me in ten years. So I turned 25 ten years later and that same person comes to me and goes, 'Are you a hero?' I said, 'Not even close!' She said why and I said, 'My hero is me at 35.' You see, every day, and every week, and every month, and every year of my life, my hero is always ten years away. I'm never going to be my hero. I'm not going to obtain that and that's fine with me because it keeps me with somebody to keep on chasing.

So to any of us, whatever those things are and whatever it is we look up to, whatever it is we look forward to and whoever it is we're chasing, to that I say Amen. To that I say alright, alright, alright. And just keep living, huh? Thank you.

Tom Hanks: 'The streets of heaven are too crowded with angels', Academy Award - 1995

21 March 1994, Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles, USA

Here's what I know. I could not be standing here without that undying love that was just sung about by, not Bruce [Springsteen], but Neil Young. And I have that in a lover that is so close to fine, we should all be able to experience such heaven right here on earth. I know also that, I should not be doing this, I should not be here, but I am because of the union of such filmmakers as Ed Saxon, Ron Nyswaner, Kristi Zea, Tak Fujimoto, Jonathan Demme -- who seems to have these [referring to the Oscar] attached to his limbs for every actor that works with him of late. And a cast that includes Antonio Banderas, who, second to my lover, is the only person I would trade for. And a cast that includes many other people, but the actor who really put his film image at risk, and shone because of his integrity, Mr. Denzel Washington, who I really must share this with.

I would not be standing here if it weren't for two very important men in my life, so... two that I haven't spoken with in awhile, but I had the pleasure of just the other evening. Mr. Rawley Farnsworth, who was my high school drama teacher, who taught me to act well the part, there all the glory lies. And one of my classmates under Mr. Farnsworth, Mr. John Gilkerson. I mention their names because they are two of the finest gay Americans, two wonderful men that I had the good fortune to be associated with, to fall under their inspiration at such a young age. I wish my babies could have the same sort of teacher, the same sort of friends.

And there lies my dilemma here tonight. I know that my work in this case is magnified by the fact that the streets of heaven are too crowded with angels. We know their names. They number a thousand for each one of the red ribbons that we wear here tonight. They finally rest in the warm embrace of the gracious creator of us all. A healing embrace that cools their fevers, that clears their skin, and allows their eyes to see the simple, self-evident, common sense truth that is made manifest by the benevolent creator of us all and was written down on paper by wise men, tolerant men, in the city of Philadelphia two hundred years ago. God bless you all. God have mercy on us all. And God bless America.

Erica Wagner: 'I had no idea what an editor did, but I wrote to Penguin and asked', Dromkeen Medal - 2017

30 November 2017, State Library of Victoria, Melbourne, Australia

Erica Wagner is the children's publisher at Allen & Unwin Australia.

Thank you, Alison, and the Dromkeen Selection Panel and the State Library for hosting this event. And thank you so much to my colleagues, Anna McFarlane and Eva Mills, who nominated me, to the fantastic team at Allen & Unwin – whose cleverness and sense of fun I appreciate so much every day – and to every author, illustrator and colleague I’ve ever worked with – this is your medal too!

This Robert Ingpen created medal symbolises so much for me. I’m conscious of the calibre of the previous recipients, and their formidable legacies, and feel honoured to be part of the Dromkeen story.

I’ve thought a lot about what I wanted to say today – so much thinking, and over thinking, that this 5-minute response was in danger of turning into 5 hours. While it was tempting to tell you about every book I’ve ever worked on, replay the sweet moments of triumph and vindication, and confess to every publishing error and indiscretion I’ve been involved with, I ended up returning to a simple question. Why is it that I’ve spent so much of my life involved with children’s books … almost 40 years in fact, if you start counting when I was 15, crushing boxes at the back of a bookshop in Brighton … ? What has held me here? The answer is short: books bring together my two great loves, literature and art. Books are the perfect package, still as relevant today as ever. And they have been the steady heartbeat to the dramas of my interior life since childhood. I cannot imagine living life without them.

I was a timid child, so books gave me language for my emotions. They enabled me to be a prince, a pharaoh, a wild white stallion! I grew up in a German-speaking household and so German fairytales, and the anarchic words and pictures of Struwwelpeter, Max und Moritz – very cautionary tales about very naughty children – remain indelibly imprinted in my psyche. I read everything – the entire oeuvre of Enid Blyton and endless animal stories, Mad magazines and Donald Duck comics. My siblings and parents all read to me – my sister reading the entire Hobbit and Lord of the Rings when I was 7 … Even my attempts at stealing were book related … it was a copy of Black Beauty that I pushed up my jumper one dark day when I was 10 … intrigued at how easy that was to do …

I have been so lucky to have found – as Agnes Nieuwenhuizen said so eloquently – the right book at the right time. 

It now seems perfectly natural that my teenage bookshop job continued on and off for 10 years while I studied briefly, travelled, lived in a tent and worked on a tomato farm in north Queensland. I wanted to get a life! Be a writer, be an artist… I’m sure my reading of Tolstoy and romance novels was in part responsible for me marrying a poet at 20 and having two children in quick succession. And it was in the bookshop, where I’d returned again to work when my children were small, that I had an epiphany – that I wanted to be an editor – that is, I wanted to work with books but not with the public. I had no idea what an editor did, but I wrote to Penguin and asked, what do you have to do to be an editor? The reply I received – to get any job in the publishing industry and work your way up, and that secretarial skills would be useful – is why I felt able to apply for a trainee editor position in the newly formed children’s department at Penguin books.

I didn’t get that job – my friend Janie Godwin did! – but a few months later, in July 1988, Julie Watts rang, asking if I was still interested … and did I want to come in for a chat … For some reason, she saw something in the young woman I was then – 25, 2 little kids, wearing a rainbow-coloured jumper and feather earrings (my smartest outfit), pretending I was just a little rusty with my non-existent typing skills. Thank you, Julie, I owe you so much, for teaching me everything about editing and giving me that magnificent lucky break.

I still remember my first day at Penguin, so scared that I would be asked to type 100 letters in triplicate, but instead Julie gave me a Victor Kelleher manuscript to read, and Janie kindly showed me (a few times, until it sunk in) how it was that one put paper into a typewriter …

Those were heady years. I was somewhat star-struck by the famous authors and illustrators striding through the corridors of the offices in Ringwood. The creative process remained a mystery, but I did learn quickly that everyone making a book needs something to help them get their work done … and it’s the editor’s job to find out what that is. I discovered that some authors effectively need to be left alone, some need to brainstorm and bounce ideas off you, some need gentle nurturing and some, stern intervention! Later I was to learn that illustrators could construct epic stories inspired by one hero image.

There were launches, conferences and festivals, and the famous Dromkeen dinners - so many ways to feel part of the wider Australian children’s book community – which remains so strong and supportive even today. I was incredibly lucky to work on seminal books with brilliant authors and illustrators – many in this room today – learning on the job, learning to trust the creative process.

At the end of the 90s, a turbulent time in my personal life, I left Penguin to start Silverfish, a new children’s list for Duffy & Snellgrove, at the same time heading overseas to my first Bologna book fair and some months in the US on the Beatrice Davis Editorial Fellowship. So much happened in that year – things I couldn’t have learnt any other way – but it did end up being a stretch too far, and I finally landed, somewhat bruised, in a new life, with a new blended extended family, at the Rathdowne Street office of Allen & Unwin. My first day was Valentine’s day in the year 2000 – and for the first few months I shared Rosalind Price’s handmade table. Thank you, Rosalind, for picking me up when I was down, and for being such a constant creative support and inspiration.

Allen & Unwin moving to the House of Alien Onion in East Melbourne was the start of yet another chapter, and over the years – as the competition ratcheted up, the book industry was rocked by the GFC, the market became more volatile, and as we realised that things just didn’t work the way they used to, new technology and systems were introduced, our team expanded and changed, we learnt to adapt – some of us kicking and screaming more than others … If this sounds somewhat chaotic, it was …

We had to go back to basics and ask again: What are books and stories for? Of course, they are for children. But where do they fit into the world of screens and endless chatter? Is there still a place for the quieter heartbeat of stories that encourage reflection, a deeper connection? At the most prosaic level, how do we help to keep our company afloat as it wrestles with the relentless financial pressures of rising costs, punishing trade conditions, an increasingly litigious culture. And definitely a more censorious one.

These are crucial moral issues, when so many people depend on you – not just in-house staff and creators, but the entire ecosystem of freelancers ­– editors, designers, photographers – printers, booksellers and our core champions, teachers and librarians, who are under enormous pressures of their own. And it does have an impact on publishing decisions, as we try to balance commercial imperatives with the very different work of nurturing creative people to fulfil their potential …

I honour the creators and champions who have gone before us. And I’m proud of the writers and artists who continue to take chances with stories, with daring imagery, with subject matter. I cheer on the next wave of editors and publishers who remain passionate about Australian voices, who are bringing a fresh perspective on our complex society, who are determined that books should not only reflect our society but inspire readers to be engaged citizens, beyond the algorithms of Facebook, to be thinking and feeling – kind! – humans who can face up to the truth of our past as we head into the future. I believe in our youth, and I believe there is nothing you can’t say to a child - you just have to find the right way of saying it. So they in turn are equipped to find the right book at the right time.

Finally, I want to thank my family, my children and grandchildren, my darling Craig Smith, who have shared this adventure with me, give meaning to everything I do and without whom I would not be here today.

Orson Welles as Shylock: 'For suffrance is the badge of all our tribe', The Merchant of Venice, Dean Martin Show - 1968

25 January 1968,

Good evening,

Dean asked me if I'd do a little Shakespeare, I decided to do something from The Merchant of Venice, you know, Sjhakespeare said just about everything that needed to be said on every subject,  and I think on the matter of bigotry, no one has ever spoken out better than he has three hundred years ago, so I'm going to do a short scene from the Merchant of Venice.

Just imagine that I'm Shylock, an old Jewish moneylender, who lives in the Jewish ghetto of Venice, hated by the Christians, and he is approached by his old enemy, the merchant Antonio who wants to borrow 3000 ducats.

Signior Antonio, many a time and oft
In the Rialto you have rated me
About my moneys and my usances:
Still have I borne it with a patient shrug,
For sufferance is the badge of all our tribe.
You call me misbeliever, cut-throat dog,
And spit upon my Jewish gaberdine,
And all for use of that which is mine own.
Well then, it now appears you need my help:
Go to, then; you come to me, and you say
‘Shylock, we would have moneys:’ you say so;
You, that did void your rheum upon my beard
And foot me as you spurn a stranger cur
Over your threshold: moneys is your suit
What should I say to you? Should I not say
‘Hath a dog money? is it possible
A cur can lend three thousand ducats?’ Or
Shall I bend low and in a bondman’s key,
With bated breath and whispering humbleness, Say this;
‘Fair sir, you spit on me on Wednesday last;
You spurn’d me such a day; another time
You call’d me dog; and for these courtesies
I’ll lend you thus much moneys’?

To bait fish withal: if it will feed nothing else, it will feed my revenge.
He hath disgraced me, and hindered me half a million;
laughed at my losses, mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies;
And what’s his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes?
Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions?
Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is?
If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?
If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that.
If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility? Revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? Why, revenge.
The villany you teach me, I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction.

Joan Baez: 'My voice is my greatest gift'. Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction - 2017

7 April 2017, Barclay's Centre,. Brooklyn, New York, USA

It gives me enormous pleasure to accept this prestigious, and very cool award tonight. Thanks to the Hall of Fame for this somewhat unlikely induction. A special thank you to my manager, Mark Spector, for having kept my career visible, viable, and vibrant.

I'm aware that I'm speaking to many young people, who, without this induction into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame would have no clue who I am. [Laughter] My granddaughter had no clue who I was until I took her backstage at a Taylor Swift concert, where she got a selfie, an autograph, a T-shirt and a newfound respect for her grandmother. 

Though one can not say I am a rock & roll artist, one cannot overlook the folk music of the Sixties and the immense effect it had on popular music, including rock & roll. Nor can anyone overlook the role I played in that phenomenon. I was lucky enough to have found my voice when coffee shops were the order of the day. My first job in music was on Tuesday nights at Club 47 in Harvard Square where I sang three sets and made fifteen dollars a night, all as I gleefully flunked out of college. I owe my beginnings to the friends and folk artists from whom I picked up the chords, the melodies, the finger picking and a budding repertoire.

"To track Joan Baez's involvement in human rights and social justice is to chart the evolution of our own moral awakening," singer-songwriter says

Again, at the right place and time, I knew and was friends with most of the rock & roll idols of the Sixties and Seventies. Some of those friendships I treasure to this day. Most of us in the community of both folk and rock music share with each other the similarities and the differences of how we got to where we are today. We also share the awareness of the blessed and the bizarre, which accompanies us in our everyday lives, lives which are seldom really private. Once a friend said to me when I was recognized and approached by a fan on the street, "Oh come on, admit it. You really like that." I told her there was nothing to admit. It was a fact. My public is a kind of family.

I am beholden to those rock and rollers who are long gone, and those who live on who have enriched and brightened my life, from vinyl to digital and everything in between - and back to vinyl. [Laughter]

My childhood and teen years were filled with classical, country and western, rhythm and blues, and the Hit Parade. When I was 16 my aunt took me to a Pete Seeger concert. And my mom brought home a Harry Belafonte album. Though Pete was not in any way gorgeous like Harry, he was already committed to making social change. He paid a high price for holding fast to his principles. I learned the meaning of “taking a risk” from Pete. The Cold War was getting a foothold and ushered in a shameful period in this country.

My family was by then Quaker, and socially and politically active. Pete's influence on me took like a good vaccine, and I turned my attention to folk music and political activism.

My voice is my greatest gift. I can speak freely about the uniqueness of it precisely because it is just that: a gift.

The Sixties icon helped invent the idea of the protest singer – more than five decades later, she's still at it

The second greatest gift was the desire to use it the way I have since I was 16 and became a student of and practitioner of nonviolence, both in my personal life and as a way of fighting for social change. What has given my life deep meaning, and unending pleasure, has been to use my voice in the battle against injustice. It has brought me in touch with my own purpose. It has also brought me in touch with people of every background. With open, generous, fun loving, hardworking people, here in this country and around the world. It has brought me in touch with the wealthy, the ones who are stuck in selfishness, and the ones who give generously of their time and resources to benefit the less fortunate, and light the way for others to do the same.

And I've met and tried to walk in the shoes of those who are hungry, thirsty, cold and cast out, people imprisoned for their beliefs, and others who have broken the law, paid the price, and now live in hopelessness and despair. Of exonerated prisoners who have spent decades in solitary confinement, awaiting execution. Of exhausted refugees, immigrants, the excluded and the bullied. Those who have fought for this country, sacrificed, and now live in the shadows of rejection. People of color, the old, the ill, the physically challenged, the LGBTQ community.

And now, in the new political and cultural reality in which we find ourselves, there is much work to be done.

Where empathy is failing and sharing has been usurped by greed and the lust for power, let us double, triple, and quadruple our own efforts to empathize and to give of our resources and our selves. Let us together repeal and replace brutality, and make compassion a priority. Together let us build a great bridge, a beautiful bridge to once again welcome the tired and the poor, and we will pay for that bridge with our commitment. We the people must speak truth to power, and be ready to make sacrifices. We the people are the only one who can create change. I am ready. I hope you are, too. I want my granddaughter to know that I fought against an evil tide, and had the masses by my side.

When all of these things are accompanied by music, music of every genre, the fight for a better world, one brave step at a time, becomes not just bearable, but possible, and beautiful.

Thank you again.

Pink: 'And you, my darling girl, are beautiful', MTV VMAs, Video Vanguard Award - 2017

27 August 2017, Forum, Inglewood, California, USA

I know I don't have a lot of time, but if I may tell you a quick story. Recently, I was driving my daughter to school and she said to me, out of the blue, 'Mama?' I said, 'Yes, baby?' She said, 'I'm the ugliest girl I know.' And I said, 'Huh?' And she was like, 'Yeah, I look like a boy with long hair.' And my brain went to Oh my god, you're 6. Why? Where is this coming from? Who said this? Can I kick a 6-year-old's ass, like what?"

But I didn't say anything. Instead I went home and I made a Powerpoint presentation for her. And in that presentation were androgynous rockstars and artists that live their truth, are probably made fun of every day of their life, and carry on, wave their flag, and inspire the rest of us. And these are artists like Michael Jackson and David Bowie and Freddie Mercury and Annie Lennox and Prince and Janis Joplin and George Michael, Elton John, so many artists — her eyes glazed over. But then I said, 'You know, I really wanna know why you feel this way about yourself.' And she said, 'Well I look like a boy,' and I said, 'Well what do you think I look like?' And she said, 'Well you're beautiful.' And I was like, 'Well, thanks. But when people make fun of me, that's what they use. They say I look like a boy or I'm too masculine or I have too many opinions, my body is too strong.'"

And I said to her, 'Do you see me growing my hair?' She said, 'No, Mama.' I said, 'Do you see me changing my body?' 'No, Mama.' 'Do you see me changing the way I present myself to the world?' 'No, Mama.' 'Do you see me selling out arenas all over the world?' 'Yes, Mama.' 'OK! So, baby girl. We don't change. We take the gravel and the shell and we make a pearl. And we help other people to change so they can see more kinds of beauty.' And to all the artists here, I'm so inspired by all of you. Thank you for being your true selves and for lighting the way for us. I'm so inspired by you guys. There's so much rad shit happening in music. And keep doing it. keep shining for the rest of us to see. And you, my darling girl, are beautiful, and I love you. Thank you, MTV. This is a really special night. Thank you, Ellen. I couldn't love you more. Thank you guys. Goodnight.

Brian Eno: 'Singing: the key to a long life', NPR essay - 2008

1 November 2008, London, United Kingdom

I believe in singing. I believe in singing together.

A few years ago a friend and I realized that we both loved singing but didn't do much of it. So we started a weekly a capella group with just four members. After a year we started inviting other people to join. We didn't insist on musical experience — in fact some of our members had never sung before. Now the group has ballooned to around 15 or 20 people.

I believe that singing is the key to long life, a good figure, a stable temperament, increased intelligence, new friends, super self-confidence, heightened sexual attractiveness and a better sense of humor. A recent long-term study conducted in Scandinavia sought to discover which activities related to a healthy and happy later life. Three stood out: camping, dancing and singing.

Well, there are physiological benefits, obviously: You use your lungs in a way that you probably don't for the rest of your day, breathing deeply and openly. And there are psychological benefits, too: Singing aloud leaves you with a sense of levity and contentedness. And then there are what I would call "civilizational benefits." When you sing with a group of people, you learn how to subsume yourself into a group consciousness because a capella singing is all about the immersion of the self into the community. That's one of the great feelings — to stop being me for a little while and to become us. That way lies empathy, the great social virtue.

Well here's what we do in an evening: We get some drinks, some snacks, some sheets of lyrics and a strict starting time. We warm up a bit first.

The critical thing turns out to be the choice of songs. The songs that seem to work best are those based around the basic chords of blues and rock and country music. You want songs that are word-rich, but also vowel-rich because it's on the long vowels sounds of a song such as "Bring It On Home To Me" ("You know I'll alwaaaaays be your slaaaaave"), that's where your harmonies really express themselves. And when you get a lot of people singing harmony on a long note like that, it's beautiful.

But singing isn't only about harmonizing pitch like that. It has two other dimensions. The first one is rhythm. It's thrilling when you get the rhythm of something right and you all do a complicated rhythm together: "Oh, when them cotton balls get a-rotten, you can't pick very much cotton." So when 16 or 20 people get that dead right together at a fast tempo that's very impressive. But the other thing that you have to harmonize besides pitch and rhythm is tone. To be able to hit exactly the same vowel sound at a number of different pitches seems unsurprising in concept, but is beautiful when it happens.

So I believe in singing to such an extent that if I were asked to redesign the British educational system, I would start by insisting that group singing become a central part of the daily routine. I believe it builds character and, more than anything else, encourages a taste for co-operation with others. This seems to be about the most important thing a school could do for you.

Related content: Brian Eno, John Peel Lecture, 2015, 'Children learn through play, but adults play through art'.

"When I started thinking about this talk a few weeks ago, I found myself writing the strange sentence, something about 'the creative industries'. And I thought, 'industries'? That’s not really quite the right word for what I think I’m doing. And I started wondering about the genesis of that term."

Full transcript and video

David Harbour: 'We will repel bullies, we will shelter freaks and outcasts', Stranger Things, Screen Actors Guild - 2017

29 January 2017, California, USA

Harbour was speaking for cast of Stranger Things which won SAG award for Best Ensemble. Trump became President 7 days earlier.

But this award from you, who take your craft seriously, and earnestly believe, like me, that great acting can change the world, is a call to arms for our fellow craftsmen and women to go deeper and, through our art, to battle against fear, self-centeredness and exclusivity of our predominantly narcissistic culture and through our craft to cultivate a more empathetic and understanding society... by revealing intimate truths that serve as a forceful reminder to folks that when they feel broken and afraid and tired, they are not alone. 

We are united in that we are all human beings and we are all together on this horrible, painful, joyous, exciting and mysterious ride that is being alive.

As we act in the continuing narrative of Stranger Things, we... will repel bullies, we will shelter freaks and outcasts, those who have no home, we will get past the lies, we will hunt monsters, and when we are at a loss amidst the hypocrisy and the casual violence of certain individuals and institutions, we will, as per chief Jim Hopper, punch some people in the face when they seek to destroy the weak, the disenfranchised, and we will do it all with soul, with heart, and with joy. We thank you for this responsibility.

Ursula K Le Guin: 'We need writers who know the difference between the production of a market commodity and the practice of an art', National Book Awards

19 November 2014, New York City, New York, USA

Thank you Neil, and to the givers of this beautiful reward, my thanks from the heart. My family, my agent, editors, know that my being here is their doing as well as mine, and that the beautiful reward is theirs as much as mine. And I rejoice at accepting it for, and sharing it with, all the writers who were excluded from literature for so long, my fellow authors of fantasy and science fiction — writers of the imagination, who for the last 50 years watched the beautiful rewards go to the so-called realists.

I think hard times are coming when we will be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now and can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies to other ways of being, and even imagine some real grounds for hope. We will need writers who can remember freedom. Poets, visionaries — the realists of a larger reality.

Right now, I think we need writers who know the difference between the production of a market commodity and the practice of an art. Developing written material to suit sales strategies in order to maximize corporate profit and advertising revenue is not quite the same thing as responsible book publishing or authorship. (Thank you, brave applauders.)

Yet I see sales departments given control over editorial; I see my own publishers in a silly panic of ignorance and greed, charging public libraries for an ebook six or seven times more than they charge customers. We just saw a profiteer try to punish a publisher for disobedience and writers threatened by corporate fatwa, and I see a lot of us, the producers who write the books, and make the books, accepting this. Letting commodity profiteers sell us like deodorant, and tell us what to publish and what to write. (Well, I love you too, darling.)

Books, you know, they’re not just commodities. The profit motive often is in conflict with the aims of art. We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings. Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings. Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art — the art of words.

I have had a long career and a good one. In good company. Now here, at the end of it, I really don’t want to watch American literature get sold down the river. We who live by writing and publishing want — and should demand — our fair share of the proceeds. But the name of our beautiful reward is not profit. It’s name is freedom.

Thank you.

Bette Midler: 'Shut that crap off!', Best Actress Tony Award - 2017

11 June 2017, Radio City Music Hall, New York City, New York, USA

I'm so honoured to receive this award tonight. I hope I don't cry, I have so many people I have to thank. I want to thank all of the Tony voters, many of whom I have actually dated ... this has been one of the greatest professioinal experiences of my entire life.

I am so grateful for all the love and affection that has greeted me and this production, it's been extrordinary

I can't remember the last time I had so much smoke blown up my ass, but there is no more room, so thank you. This is the cap. This is the cherry on the cake.

Thank producer ...

Thanks director ...

Santo La Cuasto, I actually saw him painting props in the basement of the theatre ... that's dedication.

I want to say thank you to my makeup artist Natasha Katz. She makes me look 30 years younger than I am, what can I say? Natasha, marry me, please. OK, not 30 years, maybe not 30 years, let's make it 20. OK, I look okay. But Natascha is good!

Thanks sound design.

I want to say thank you to Campbell Young for the most beautiful hair on Broadway, and I am not sh*tting you people, not for one minute.

Thank you to musical director ...

Thanks co-stars ...

Thank yous over music ...

Shat that crap off!

[music shuts off]

I just want to say that revival is an interesting word. It means that something is near death and it was brought back to life. Hello Dolly! never really went away. It has been here all along. It is in our DNA, it's in our national — Jerry Herman's songs will live forever. It's optimism, it's democracy, it's color, it's love of life, it's hilarity. This is a classic. Come and see it. It's absolutely — it's not just me! The whole thing is utterly — this thing has the ability to lift your spirits in these terrible, terrible times. Come and see it.

Kanye West: 'You need to appreciate every moment', Grammy acceptance - 2005

13 February 2005, Los Angeles, California, USA

Umm, ya'll might as well get the music ready cause this is gonna take a while. Umm, when I had my accident, I found out at that moment nothing in life is promised except death. If you had the opportunity to play this game of life, you need to appreciate every moment. A lot of people don't appreciate their moment until its passed. And then you gotta tell them Al Bundy stories, "you remember when I..." but umm. Right now, is my time and my moment, thanks to the fans, thanks to the accident, thanks to God, thanks to Roc-A-Fella, Jay Z, Dame Dash, G, my mother, Rhymefest, everyone that has helped me and I plan to celebrate. I plan to celebrate and scream and pop champaign every chance I get cause I'm at the Grammys baby! I know... I know everybody ask me that question, they want to know, "what Kanye is getting well louder, he's gonna do something crazy." Everybody want to know what I would do if I didn't win... I guess we'll never know.

Pawel Pawlikowski: 'I would like to dedicate it to my late wife', Oscars Acceptance - 2015

22 February 2015, Dolby Theatre, Los Angeles, California, USA

Ah, god. How did I get here? We made a film about – as you saw, black and white – about the need for silence and withdrawal from the world and contemplation. And here we are at the epicenter of noise and world attention. Fantastic, you know, life is full of surprises.

So, I'd like to thank the Academy. I'm honored, surprised and overwhelmed. I'd like to thank the people who backed our film: the producers, Eric Abraham of Portobello, Piotr Dzieciol, Agnieszka Odorowicz of the Polish Film Institute, and many others. They backed – oh, and a U.S. distributor who did a great job [music begins to play] for very little money. Oh, wrap up. Good, okay. So, quickly to the… And to my Polish friends who are in front of the TV. The crew who were in the trenches with us and who are totally drunk now. And you are fantastic, you were brilliant. You carried me through this film. And you are what I love about Poland. You're resilient, courageous, brave and funny. [Music builds to a loud crescendo.] And you can take a drink. And "Ida," I would like to dedicate it to my late wife [music ends] and my parents, who are not among the living but who are totally inside this film, and they have a lot to do with the film. And my children, who are hopefully watching, who are still alive. [Audience applause builds loudly.] Thank you, thank you. Victor and Maria... [Music begins again.] Victor and Maria, I love you. You are the main prize. Thank you.

Matthew McConaughey: 'There are three things that I need each day', Oscars acceptance - 2014

2 March 2014, Dolby Theatre, Los Angeles, California, USA

Thank you to the academy for this. All six thousand members. Thank you to the other nominees. Thank you -- all of these performances were impeccable. In my opinion I didn't see a false note anywhere. I want to thank Jean-Marc Vallee our director. I want to thank Jared Leto and Jennifer Garner who I worked with daily.

There are three things that I need each day. One, I need something to look up to, another to look forward to, and another is someone to chase.

First off, I want to thank God because that's who I look up. He's graced my life with opportunities that I know are not of my hand or of any other human hand. He's shown me that it's a scientific fact that gratitude reciprocates. In the words of the late Charlie Laughton, who said, ‘When you got God you got a friend and that friend is you.'

To my family is to what I look forward to. To my father who I know is up there right now with a big pot of gumbo, he has a big lemon meringue pie over there. He's probably in his underwear and has a big can of Miller Lite and he's dancing right now. To you dad, you taught me how to be a man.

To my mother who's here tonight, who taught me and my two older brothers -- demanded -- that we respect ourselves. And in turn we learned we were better able to learn how to respect others. Thank you for that mama.

To my wife, Camilla, and my kids Levi, Vida and Mr Stone (Livingstone), the courage you give me every time I walk through the door is unparallelled. You are the four people in my life that I want to make the most proud of me. Thank you.

And to my hero. That's who I chase. When I was 15 years old I had a very important person in my life come and ask me 'Who's your hero?' I said, 'I thought about it and it's me in ten years. So I turned 25 ten years later and that same person comes to me and goes, 'Are you a hero?' I said, 'Not even close!' She said why and I said, 'My hero is me at 35.' You see, every day, and every week, and every month, and every year of my life, my hero is always ten years away. I'm never going to be my hero. I'm not going to obtain that and that's fine with me because it keeps me with somebody to keep on chasing.

So to any of us, whatever those things are and whatever it is we look up to, whatever it is we look forward to and whoever it is we're chasing, to that I say Amen. To that I say alright, alright, alright. And just keep living, huh? Thank you.

Oliver Stone: 'You don't have to fit in', Writers Guild of America - 2017

19 February 2017, Beverly Hilton Hotel, California, USA

It’d be remiss of me not to remind you, especially you younger writers, that you can be critical of your government and your society. You don’t have to fit in. It’s fashionable now to take shots at Republicans and Trump and avoid the Obamas and Clintons. But remember this: In the 13 wars we’ve started over the last 30 years and the $14 trillion we’ve spent, and the hundreds of thousands of lives that have perished from this earth, remember that it wasn’t one leader but a system, both Republican and Democrat.

And call it what you will, military industrial, security, money, media, complex.

It’s a system that has been perpetuated under the guise that these are just wars justifiable in the name of our flag that flies so produly over our lives.

Our country has become more prosperous for many but in the name of that wealth we cannot justify our system as a center for the world’s values. But we continue to create such war and chaos in the world.

No need to go through the victims, but we know we’ve intervened in more than 100 countries with invasion, regime change, economic chaos. Or hybrid war, soft power, whatever you want to call it, it’s war of some kind. In the end, it’s become a system leading to the death of this planet and the extinction of us all.

I’ve fought these people who practice war for most of my life. It’s a tiring game. And mostly you’ll get your ass kicked. With all the criticism and insults you’ll receive, and the flattery too, it’s important to remember, if you believe in what you’re saying and you can stay the course, you can make a difference.

I urge you to find a way to remain alone with yourself, listen to your silences, not always in a writer’s room. Try to find not what the crowd wants so that you can be successful, but try instead to find the true inner meaning of your life here on earth, and never give up on your heart in your struggle for peace, decency, and telling the truth.

Sean Condon: 'How not to get an agent', The Lunchtime Soapbox, Wheeler Centre - 2012

5 July 2012, Wheeler Centre, Melbourne, Australia

Hello, my name is Sean Condon.

As you may or may not know I was – or maybe am, I’m not too sure anymore – I am or was a writer. I wrote books and stories and articles and funny pieces because I was, I thought, quite good at it and I enjoyed it. I loved the hours and, as everyone knows, you make a lot of money from it and get to hang out with celebrities and catch private jets everywhere. Plus people respect the hell out of you. As a career path, I can’t recommend it highly enough.

I had an agent, frequently described as the doyenne of UK literary agents. Her name was Pat Kavanagh. Her friend and client Clive James described her as “beautiful, clever and loved to laugh, but she could also have a blunt way with a fool. She could make publishers shake in their handmade shoes.”

Her roster of clients included Ruth Rendell, Margaret Drabble, Robert Harris, Joanna Trollope, William Trevor, the British poet laureate Andrew Motion, her husband Julian Barnes… And me.

She came to be my agent in a pretty straightforward fashion. This was back in October 2001. I was living in Amsterdam and I’d published three books. I wrote to her, telling her what was what – that it was October 2001. That I was living in Amsterdam, and that I’d published three books and was looking for representation. I expected not to hear from her, ever but she asked to see the ms of my novel and a coupe of weeks later called – actually telephoned me – to say that she liked it and would be happy to be my agent. It was pretty amazing. I met her several times, had lunch once or twice, called her at home once (and spoke to Julian Barnes), she sold my novel to a great publisher and everything was pretty nice and I was happy because, why not? I kept on writing and she kept on representing me and then in October 2008 she died suddenly of a brain tumor.

It was sad and awful and I have nothing glib to say about it. Her support and encouragement meant an enormous amount to me; like most writers – the good ones, anyway – I’m not particularly confident and having someone like Pat in my corner was invaluable.

When I started to consider replacing her, my first thought – and I have to be honest, my first choice – was the Wylie Agency, helmed by my former agent’s arch-nemesis, Andrew Wylie. Pat and Andrew became famous enemies after Wylie famously poached Pat’s client Martin Amis away from her with a half-million pound advance for his 1995 novel The Information. I thought it would be a nice irony to go from her to him, and a 500,000-pound advance would be fine with me, too. The Wylie client list is, to put it mildly, impressive. They represent Dave Eggers, Philip Roth, Salman Rushdie, Elmore Leonard, Raffi Khatchadourian and practically every other New Yorker writer, King Abdullah II, our own Elliot Perlman and someone actually called Adonis (although these last two may in fact be the same person), as well as the Estate of Everybody Who Ever Published Anything. But the problem with the Wylie Agency is, you don’t pick them, they pick you. Or to put it the way they do on their very austere and intimidating website: “The Wylie Agency does not currently accept unsolicited submissions. Not now, not ever. So fuck you.” I added that last bit but you get a pretty strong sense that that’s what they mean. Nevertheless, I wrote to an agent there, Sarah Chalfont, and explained my circumstances. She didn’t get back to me so I knew I’d have to settle for an agency that reps fewer Nobel and Pulitzer prize winners (as well, for some reason, Al Gore’s wife, Tipper, author of 1987’s ‘Raising PG Kids in an X-Rated Society’).

So I began sending out letters of enquiry (to those agencies who allow such boldness.) But it’s not a simple matter of drafting something snappy and interesting and then doing a mass mail out. Each agency has its own special, individual, frankly pernickety requirements of such letters because they’re all so desperate for an excuse not to read your ms that if you don’t rigorously follow their guidelines – such as, all sentences must begin with the letter Q – they’ll eagerly, almost ecstatically disregard you/your enquiry/your work.

So my letter of enquiry, a template which I tweaked and altered where necessary was this:

Dear Sir/Madam,

My name is Sean Condon; I am writing to see if you might be interested in taking a look at a manuscript I have written.

I should also mention, without wishing to seem arrogant or presumptuous, that I am a published author (Penguin, 4th Estate, McSweeneys, Lonely Planet Journeys and many others have published my work) and that the reason that I am seeking representation is because my former agent, Pat Kavanagh of PFD and United Agents, passed away.

MICHAEL SWEENEY'S METHOD is a [blah blah blah] YA book that was published by Penguin in Australia in late 2007. Briefly, it is about what happens to the young narrator, Michael Sweeney, in his final year of high school when a semi-mysterious American student shows up. It's about doing the right thing, getting into trouble and falling in love. Also, a school production of The Breakfast Club plays a critical role.

I would be grateful if you would consider taking a look at it.

If you like, you can learn a little more about me and my work at sean-condon-writer.squarespace.com

Thanks for your time.

Yours sincerely,

Sean Condon


Over the next few months I sent this letter off to ICM, WMA (where I already had two film agents repping me for film work at the L.A office), Waxman, Levine/Greenberg, Writers House, Foundry Media, Trident Media, Dystel, Cheney Literary, Fine Print Literary, Sanford Greenburger and Associates, Betsy Lerner at Dunow, Carlson, Lerner, Neeti Madan at Sterling Lord, Sarah Burnes at Gernert Agency, Diana Fox fox literary, Jill Grinberg at Jill Grinberg Literary, Jill Corcoran at the Herman Agency, Herman Agency at the Jill Corcoran Group, Julia Churchill at Greenhouse Literary, Agent X at the XYZ Agency and many, many more, including a woman named Susan Hawk at The Bent Agency of Brooklyn, New York.

Almost without exception, the responses I received were along the lines of “you’re a very talented writer” (which is true) but it’s a very difficult marketplace right now (which is also true, but of far less flattering interest to me) and you deserve an enthusiastic agent who can passionately champion your work blah blah blah we wish you every success in finding the perfect agent and publisher for your work.

Except for the one from Susan Hawk at The Bent Agency of Brooklyn, New York.

Hers read:

Dear Sean,

Thank you so much for writing me about your project. I read and consider each query carefully and while yours is not exactly what I am looking for, I would certainly encourage you keep trying. I know your work is important to you and I am grateful that you wrote to me.

All best,

Susan
The Bent Agency
204 Park Place, #2
Brooklyn, NY 11238

Despite the claim of ‘considering each query carefully’ the response sounded suspiciously… generic and oddly hollow. And there was no mention of what a talented writer I was. So I sent another ‘test’ email.

SEPTEMBER 22, 2010

Hello Susan,

I have an idea for a kids' book. It's about a rock named Rock who sits around doing rock-like things such as not moving and coping with the elements. What do you think?

regards,

Sean

After carefully considering my query, she replied:

Dear Sean,

Thank you so much for writing me about your project. I read and consider each query carefully and while yours is not exactly what I am looking for, I would certainly encourage you keep trying. I know your work is important to you and I am grateful that you wrote to me.
All best,

So I wrote:

Dear Susan,
Did you really consider my semi-geological query carefully? Be honest – I can take it.
Yours,
Sean

Silence. I waited patiently for a month or two before sending her a nudge:

Hey Hawkey,

It’s Connie the Rock man here. I haven’t heard from you for a while, I guess because you’re carefully reading and considering my last email with the perspicacity, perspicuity and perspiration that’s put you at the very top of your game (Brooklyn Division). Nevertheless I thought I’d send you this brief update on all things Rock.

I’ve decided on a title for the kids’ book about a rock named Rock who does rock-based things (like not moving, not speaking, not emoting in any way despite suffering many hardships such as being stepped and/or rained on):

Rock: [FULL COLON] My Story; [SEMI COLON] A Tale of Courage and Redemption with a Neat Third-Act Twist; [SEMI COLON] For Children of All Ages. [FULL STOP] A Novel.

What do you think? Please send me the list of publishers you plan on enveloping in a fierce bidding war for this sure-to-be-hot property as soon as you have carefully read and considered this email.

Rockspectfully yours,

Sean

Well, this last one really got her attention and she fired off a response:

Dear Sean,

Thank you so much for writing me about your project. I read and consider each query carefully and while yours is not exactly what I am looking for, I would certainly encourage you keep trying. I know your work is important to you and I am grateful that you wrote to me.
All best,

The months rolled by… Every few weeks I’d receive a delayed and often somewhat patronising reply, such as this one from Julia Churchill at Greenhouse Literary: “While your story has some nice points, I’m afraid it doesn’t stand out quite enough for me.”

Another problem with the ms soon emerged.

“While there really is so much to love here, and while this was a success in Australia, the setting doesn’t quite translate to the American YA market I unfortunately have to pass on this.” So said Kerry Sparks at Levine Greenberg. While Steven Malk at Writers House wrote, “We thought this was a great concept, and that the voice and the setting felt authentic and realistic. However, we worried that the Australian setting and the slow pacing at the beginning would make this a tough sell in the American market, so I'm sorry to say that we must pass on this project. I wish I could be writing with better news, as we do think you are a strong writer.”

It got pretty depressing, hearing over and over again what a tough market it is and how the slow action took place in the wrong country. And in a particularly low moment of rage and despair I wrote this:

Dear Blah

My name is blah and my book is called blah and it is about blah blah.

Among the reasons you may not want to represent it are: it is not set in the USA and certain readers may find this troubling; there are no vampires in it; nobody is really, really hungry.

Please choose one of these and press reply.

Thanks for your time.

Yours sincerely… Blah

Obviously, I never sent this to anyone because I am not crazy.

But I didn’t give up – I didn’t give up because all the advice websites about everything tell you never to give up – and boy are they wrong. I know that now, but I did not know it two years ago.

My not giving up meant going out with yet another round of queries, and one exchange in particular is instructive. Once again it was my usual letter, adjusted according to whatever unique and specific requirements this literary agency demanded, but in this case I was pitching Michael Sweeney’s Method and another novel, called The Third Act…

It’s Thursday, February 4, 2010 11:42 a.m

Dear Sir/Madam,

My name is Sean Condon; I am writing to see if you might be interested in taking a look at two manuscripts I have written.

MICHAEL SWEENEY'S METHOD is blah blah blah

THE THIRD ACT is the story of two friends who, in the early 1970s, drive from New Orleans to Los Angeles with the idea of turning whatever happens to them into the screenplay for a movie. Along the way they meet a mysterious blonde and are pursued by two Mexican killers. And the whole thing is narrated by the ghost of a long-dead Choctaw Indian.

I would be grateful if you would consider taking a look at either or both of
them.

Thanks for your time.

Yours sincerely,

Sean Condon

A few days later I received this:

Thank you for submitting your query to InkWell Management. Unfortunately, your project is not one that I think would be right for our agency at this time.

Publishing is a subjective business, and other agents may well feel differently. I wish you all the best in your search for representation and publication.

Sincerely,

Charlie Olsen

**

And very promptly, I sent back this:

Dear Mr Olsen,

Please take the time to read my polite, correctly-spelled letter of enquiry a little more carefully and make the few slight alterations to the form reply with which you have so heedlessly responded.

Yours sincerely,

Sean Condon

**
Five minutes later:

Sean,

Your book is not for me.

Best,

Charlie

**

Me:

Good lord, Charlie - there are TWO projects mentioned in the enquiry. That would require a plural form of rejection, i.e 'books', 'projects' and 'are'. If you can't even properly absorb a few paragraphs I'd seriously question your ability to apprehend an entire manuscript; of course, I'm only a writer, while you're an agent so you'd probably know better.

SPC

**

Him:

Sean,

What are you hoping to accomplish here? I'm not interested in either project and my name is not 'Dear Sir/Madam' so the personal letter of enquiry wasn't very personal and neither was my response. Best of luck getting it published but I won't be working with you on this.
My best,
Charlie

**

Condon:

Dear Charlie,

What I’m hoping to achieve by this wearying back and forth is that next time you see fit to summarily dismiss an enquiry you will do so with just a little touch of humanity. Being a writer is quite dispiriting enough without being further ground down by a succession of impersonal form letters, and while I’m not suggesting that you tailor a thoughtful, empathetic reply to every feckless sap that arrives in your in-box, I don’t think it’s too much to ask that you actually address the content of his or her enquiry. (For example, if a person is pitching more than one project, throw in a couple of ‘s’s when you tell them you’re not interested.) As far as your somewhat petulant outburst of “my name is not 'Dear Sir/Madam' so the personal letter of enquiry wasn't very personal and neither was my response” – the submission guidelines on the Inkwell site allow only for initial correspondence to be sent to info@etc, therefore ‘Dear Sir/Madam’, however personally upsetting this may be to the sir or madam in question, is the only option.

Finally, to your wishing me luck in getting ‘it’ published; you’re very kind, but once again your powers of reading and comprehension desert you. It’s already been published – and not by me, by Penguin – and what I am looking for is a US publisher. And as soon as I stop receiving robotic form letters I’m pretty sure I’ll find one because, as you would be in a position to appreciate if you bothered to read it, it’s a good book.

Here are some more things you might find irritating about me:
http://seancondonauthor.tumblr.com/about

Yours sincerely,

Sean

Olsen:

Sean,

You're vicious. Send me "Michael Sweeney's Method." But if it's something I don't like, don't expect me to write you a two-page paper on why that is so you can sell it with someone else. Deal?

Best,
Charlie

Three months pass until…

Tuesday, May 4, 2010 2:17 AM

Dear Sean,
I'm sorry to keep you waiting. I've read about half of Michael Sweeney’s Method and I don't think it's something I can sell. You have a finely-tuned wit but the story just didn't grab me as much as the idea — I wish I could come back with a positive answer! Thanks for sharing two of your books with me, and best of luck searching for a new agent. If you have anything else you'd like a read on, feel free to send.

My best,
Charlie Olsen

Eventually he passed on both books and that was the end of that. We parted on good terms.

**

By now it had been the best part of a year since I’d begun my search to replace Pat and it was time to review the situation. And during my three-minute review it occurred to me that I hadn’t heard from a certain Agent X at the XYZ Agency.

Back in February 2010 she’d responded to my query promptly, nicely and thusly:

Dear Sean (if I may),

Thank you for querying me.

I would be happy to consider MICHAEL SWEENEY'S METHOD. Please email the full ms to me and cc Assistant P in my office at blahblahblah.com

I look forward to reading.

All best,

Agent X

Eleven months and a handful of extremely inoffensive emails to Agent X (cc-ing Assistant P) later, I broke… It wasn’t that I thought there was the slightest chance that this person would want to represent me or that there was the slightest chance that the book might find a U.S publisher; those hopes were long gone, but it just burned me up that after an initially pleasant beginning this person – this human being – could just so coldly ignore me. (I should also point out that she or he was far from the only one; lots of them are more than happy to pretend that you don’t exist, even a tiny bit. But there’s not much you can do about that without seeming harrassing and crazy.) Anyway, I guess that a year of failure and repudiation had finally gotten to me. So I wrote the following email to Agent X, which I realise probably does make me seem a little bit crazy.

Saturday, November 10, 2010 6:34 PM
Subject: Re: Michael Sweeney's Method

Ms (or Mr) X,
I have to confess that I’m somewhat mystified about what may have occurred during our brief correspondence that’s inspired you to treat me and my follow-up enquiries with such contempt. Was the sample of my work that I sent you so utterly wretched that you simply cannot bring yourself even to tell me get lost? Whatever the reason, your resolute ignorance of the polite, patient emails I’ve sent you over the past few months is as dispiriting as it is despicable. I’m sure you don’t give a good goddam what some stranger from the bottom of the world thinks of your basic social morality but if you feel even a slight sense of shame you may find a small measure of consolation in the fact that you’re far from alone in your behaviour, that rude silence in the face of genuine hope is the incredibly lazy, incredibly dismaying default ‘response’ of many others in your profession.

Seven years later I still await her – or his – reply.

**

Recently, in preparation for today, I checked back in with the Bent Agency of Brooklyn NY. This time I wasn’t pitching my story about the rock who does rock-like things; this time I was going with a tried and tested classic – I was pitching Maurice Sendak’s multi-million selling classic, Where the Wild Things Are. Only under a different name. Before sending my pitch through, though, I read some of the advice for aspiring authors they’d posted on their website, just to ensure that mine and Maurice’s idea was on the money.

BENT ADVICE:

Consider your story in your opening, where is your protagonist? Are they doing something mundane like flossing?
NO!
Are they dreaming, or rambling through a monologue, giving the reader too much information before we even know what they’re about?
NO WAY!
Are you writing the moment that will change their life and set them on the first stages of this unstoppable journey they’re about to take?
HELL FUCKING YES I AM!
Or are you starting at point A when there’s not really a point B? WHAT?

March 1 2012

Dear Ms Hawk,

My name is Sean Condon. I am a writer. I’m querying you with an idea.

My picture book is called ‘Erase Main Duck’.* It’s about a kid who has a tantrum and won’t eat his dinner and then he gets in a boat (possibly imaginary) and visits a land where he becomes king of these creatures he finds there and then gets tired and goes back home on the boat (possibly imaginary) and, despite expectations (the kid’s; the reader’s), his dinner is still hot.

It’s for young readers; the word count is 336. I’ll send you all of them – in the right order – if you show even a slight bit of genuine interest in this idea.

Sincerely,

Sean Condon

You can probably guess the nature and tone – perhaps even the exact words – of Susan Hawk’s reply.

* Anagram for 'Maurice Sendak'.

Purchase Michael Sweeney's Method here for kindle and other devices.

Larry David: "I not only hate writing the shows, I hate all kinds of writing", WGA Awards, Paddy Chayefsky Laurel Award - 2011

2 February 2011, East Coast ceremony, New York City, USA

Jason Alexander: I first encountered Larry David — this is true — at the Improv Comedy Club in New York City in the mid 1980s. The man was introduced as a comic. He lurched out onto the stage sweating and profoundly uncomfortable, launched into some diatribe about the improper use of the tu form over the usted form in the Spanish language, and after — I kid you not — a minute and a half of incomprehensible banter about "Et tu, Brute?," he accused the audience of being ignorant, euphemisms of the female anatomy, threw down his microphone, and stormed from the stage.

    To my amazement, less than a few years later, I would attain heights of fame and fortune I had never imagined by playing a character who was a thinly disguised alter-ego for that very same man. And I thank God for that blessing every day.

Larry David: Thanks Jason, it was really sweet of you to do this, although I have no doubt I'll be getting a call from you in the next few weeks asking me to do something very distasteful in return. "Larry, my wife's doing a save the poultry event, she'd like you to be the guest speaker. I think you owe me I gave you the Paddy Chayefsky Award."

I also want to thank my pal, the brilliant Larry Charles, for doing the thankless task of making that video. I don't know who the guy is he's talking about, but I'd like to meet him, sound very cool. Okay, to the matter at and. First off, I just like to say to Paddy Chayefsky, I'm really, really sorry. Please don't blame me, I had nothing to do with it. Apparently some of the same people who made the decisions about our last strike were also involved in this. So don't take it out on me.

And if it's any consolation, I won't put the award where anybody can see it. I'm thinking basement. So maybe when they come to fix the pipes, the plumber might spot it, and if he asks me what it is I'll just tell him it's from bowling. What's really ironic about this whole thing is that I hate writing. Nothing puts me to sleep faster than picking up a pen. Within minutes, I'm out cold.

I not only hate writing the shows, I hate all kinds of writing. Recommendations, thank you notes, excusing my daughter from school, condolence letters ... Oh those are the worst. Any expression of sympathy. I'd rather blow my own head off and make probably have to write them to me. And, of course, this speech.

As soon as I found out about the award, I immediately called the Guild and asked them what the shortest speech on record was for anyone who's ever been given this. Its ruined my life for the last two months. Not five minutes have gone by without me saying to myself, "You stupid schmuck. Why did you do this?" I actually started resenting the Guild for choosing me. It's almost like they did it on purpose just to accept me. It's like a sick joke. It's not funny.

I'm only sorry my mother is not alive to be here tonight because there's no doubt she would have stood up not shouted, "Larry? Are you sure? You're giving an award to Larry? Morty, they're giving an award to Larry." Her great dream for me was to become a mailman. Her dream. That's her best-case scenario. "If only my boy could deliver the mail. Please God, that's not asking too much, and wear a uniform."

She literally begged me to take a civil service test. "Please Larry, take the test." She was like Rod Steiger in On the Waterfront begging Brando to take the money in the cab. "Please take the test. Take the civil service test, take it, take it." I said, "No." She said, "What are you going to do?" And I really didn't know. At the time I was supporting myself by driving a limo for an old lady who was half blind and had no idea that I wasn't wearing the uniform and that the car was filthy.

I did that for a year, and then one night I went to the Improv, saw a bunch of comedians, and I thought, Jesus, theses people seem just like me. They're complete losers who do nothing and get up and talk about how miserable they are. Are you kidding? I can do that. And it had the bonus of sounding like a cool thing to say to impress women when they ask what I did, although I soon discovered that was not the case at all. I could have said I was a mailman and done just as poorly.

I told my parents about wanting to be a comedian and my mother said, "You're not funny, Larry. I've never heard you say anything funny." And my father backed her up, "She's right, she's right. You're not funny. Why do you think you're funny? You're not funny." So, I started doing it, but as Jason alluded to, I was not all that successful. My therapist at the time said I wasn't really temperamentally suited for it for the simple reason that if the audience didn't laugh I would scream and curse them.

"You stupid, fucking morons. You don't know anything!" I remember even walking the streets in New York looking for good spots to live in case I ever became homeless. I would mentally note them. Yeah, yeah, 44th between 5th and 6th. Good steam vent, there's an overhang. I got to remember this. I bombed all the time. Got heckled unmercifully. People threw things at me. I wallowed in self-pity. "Why me? Why? Why can't I do anything? I don't understand. It's not fair."

And then in 1988, Jerry Seinfeld asked me to develop a show with him. I'd never written a half hour before. I didn't even know the format. The number of pages, I had no idea what I was doing. I prayed for the show not to get picked up. Doing one was hard enough. How could I possibly do 22? It was impossible. I thought of all the half hours on television. All of the one hours. How did the writers do it week after week? Even the bad shows I was admiring, just for the fact that they got gone. When it got picked up I cried. I thought, "Are they insane? Why are they picking up this show? What is it?"

Then after a few weeks, I remember I was filling out a form in the doctor's office, and in the space next to occupation, I put in writer for the first time. That made me feel really smart. Oh, Jesus, I'm a writer. Holy shit, this is very cool. Although, who knows, maybe if I filled in mailman I would have felt just as good about it.

Now as much as it pains me, I'm going to be a little gracious, even at the risk of boring you. I have to thank Chris Albrect and Budd Frieman from the Improv, and Rick Newman from Catch a Rising Star, who consistently gave me spots in New York even though more often than not I turned the crowd into an angry mob. Rick Ludwin from NBC who stuck his neck out to get Seinfeld on the air. Of course Jerry Seinfeld, without whom, I'd probably be sitting on that steam vent on 44th street, screaming obscenities at passers by. Everything I wrote he improved.

I could so say the same for Alec Berg, Jeff Schaffer, and Dave Mandel, who've done such great work on Curb these last few years and the main reason I continue to do it. The remarkable Seinfeld cast. It's unbelievable. When I did these things in real life, I was scorned, mocked, and shunned. When they did it on the show, people laughed and loved them.

And the incredible Curb cast who helped me enact my revenge fantasies with such aplomb. Chris Albrect again, for putting Curb on the air and allowing a bald man to star in a comedy for the first time since Phil Silvers played Bilko. Of course, he is bald, so maybe it wasn't such a big deal. And the current HBO team of Richard Plepler, Mike Lombardo, and Sue Naegle, who give me whatever I want. I only hope I don't spoil my children the way HBO has spoiled me. And finally the writer's guild for this award.

But you know, there's a disturbing element surrounding this. I've noticed that whenever something good happens to me, it's usually followed by something terrible. And this thing has got disaster and doom written all over it. I mean it's a great honour but it's not worth getting hit by a bus. So, thank you Writer's Guild for the death sentence. I only hope I live a few more months to enjoy it. Thank you.

Jerry Seinfeld: 'I love advertisting, because I love lying', Clio award acceptance - 2014

1 October 2014, New York City, New York, USA

I am excited to win this. This is the award they give you when they don’t think you can actually win one, but they think you’ve done a pretty good job and seem to have been around for quite some time, and that’s how I got it.

I would like to thank Ogilvy & Mather and American Express for getting me into this business. That was the first time I did it. I would like to thank my manager George Shapiro, my incredible wife Jessica, and Ammirati for keeping me going.

I love advertising, because I love lying. In advertising, everything is the way you wish it was. I don’t care that it won’t be like that when I actually get the product being advertised, because in between seeing the commercial and owning the thing, I’m happy, and that’s all I want. Tell me how great the thing is going to be. I love it. I don’t need to be happy all the time. I just want to enjoy the commercial. I want to get the thing. We know the product is going to stink. We know that, because we live in the world, and we know that everything stinks. We all believe, hey, maybe this one won’t stink. We are a hopeful species. Stupid but hopeful.

But we’re happy in that moment between the commercial and the purchase, and I think spending your life trying to dupe innocent people out of hard-won earnings to buy useless, low-quality, misrepresented items and services is an excellent use of your energy. Because a brief moment of happiness is pretty good.

I also think that just focusing on making money and buying stupid things is a good way of life. I believe materialism gets a bad rap. It’s not about the amount of money. Nothing’s better than a BIC pen, a VW Beetle, or a pair of regular Levi’s. If your things don’t make you happy, you’re not getting the right things. This will all be in my new book, Soulful Materialism, which is in the planning stages at this moment.

I have always wanted a Clio. I don’t know much about it, but I know it’s a good award, because in 1991 they screwed up this whole presentation, and there were a bunch of awards left over, and all of these ad people here climbed up onto the stage and tried to grab them. To me, that says this means something. That really happened, and it’s my all-time favourite award show occurrence because it was so honest.

People just said, I want a damn Clio, and they went for it, and that is why I am happy right now. I got this. I didn’t really win it, but I got it. And tomorrow, I don’t know where this is going to be. It’ll be somewhere. Eventually I’ll be dead. Someone will just take it or sell it or throw it out. That’s fine. I’m happy now. The same way those executives were in 1991 when they ran onto this stage and grabbed trophies that weren’t theirs. But it trumped up their phoneycareers and meaningless lives.

Thank you all for this great honour and for all your great work. I hope it makes you happy as you have made me happy for this five minutes of my life, which will last until I get to the edge of this stage, and it hits me that this was all a bunch of nonsense.

Thank you, and have a great evening.

Albert Camus: 'For myself, I cannot live without my art', Nobel banquet speech - 1957

10 December 1957, City Hall, Stockholm, Sweden

In receiving the distinction with which your free Academy has so generously honoured me, my gratitude has been profound, particularly when I consider the extent to which this recompense has surpassed my personal merits. Every man, and for stronger reasons, every artist, wants to be recognized. So do I. But I have not been able to learn of your decision without comparing its repercussions to what I really am. A man almost young, rich only in his doubts and with his work still in progress, accustomed to living in the solitude of work or in the retreats of friendship: how would he not feel a kind of panic at hearing the decree that transports him all of a sudden, alone and reduced to himself, to the centre of a glaring light? And with what feelings could he accept this honour at a time when other writers in Europe, among them the very greatest, are condemned to silence, and even at a time when the country of his birth is going through unending misery?

I felt that shock and inner turmoil. In order to regain peace I have had, in short, to come to terms with a too generous fortune. And since I cannot live up to it by merely resting on my achievement, I have found nothing to support me but what has supported me through all my life, even in the most contrary circumstances: the idea that I have of my art and of the role of the writer. Let me only tell you, in a spirit of gratitude and friendship, as simply as I can, what this idea is.

For myself, I cannot live without my art. But I have never placed it above everything. If, on the other hand, I need it, it is because it cannot be separated from my fellow men, and it allows me to live, such as I am, on one level with them. It is a means of stirring the greatest number of people by offering them a privileged picture of common joys and sufferings. It obliges the artist not to keep himself apart; it subjects him to the most humble and the most universal truth. And often he who has chosen the fate of the artist because he felt himself to be different soon realizes that he can maintain neither his art nor his difference unless he admits that he is like the others. The artist forges himself to the others, midway between the beauty he cannot do without and the community he cannot tear himself away from. That is why true artists scorn nothing: they are obliged to understand rather than to judge. And if they have to take sides in this world, they can perhaps side only with that society in which, according to Nietzsche's great words, not the judge but the creator will rule, whether he be a worker or an intellectual.

By the same token, the writer's role is not free from difficult duties. By definition he cannot put himself today in the service of those who make history; he is at the service of those who suffer it. Otherwise, he will be alone and deprived of his art. Not all the armies of tyranny with their millions of men will free him from his isolation, even and particularly if he falls into step with them. But the silence of an unknown prisoner, abandoned to humiliations at the other end of the world, is enough to draw the writer out of his exile, at least whenever, in the midst of the privileges of freedom, he manages not to forget that silence, and to transmit it in order to make it resound by means of his art.

None of us is great enough for such a task. But in all circumstances of life, in obscurity or temporary fame, cast in the irons of tyranny or for a time free to express himself, the writer can win the heart of a living community that will justify him, on the one condition that he will accept to the limit of his abilities the two tasks that constitute the greatness of his craft: the service of truth and the service of liberty. Because his task is to unite the greatest possible number of people, his art must not compromise with lies and servitude which, wherever they rule, breed solitude. Whatever our personal weaknesses may be, the nobility of our craft will always be rooted in two commitments, difficult to maintain: the refusal to lie about what one knows and the resistance to oppression.

For more than twenty years of an insane history, hopelessly lost like all the men of my generation in the convulsions of time, I have been supported by one thing: by the hidden feeling that to write today was an honour because this activity was a commitment - and a commitment not only to write. Specifically, in view of my powers and my state of being, it was a commitment to bear, together with all those who were living through the same history, the misery and the hope we shared. These men, who were born at the beginning of the First World War, who were twenty when Hitler came to power and the first revolutionary trials were beginning, who were then confronted as a completion of their education with the Spanish Civil War, the Second World War, the world of concentration camps, a Europe of torture and prisons - these men must today rear their sons and create their works in a world threatened by nuclear destruction. Nobody, I think, can ask them to be optimists. And I even think that we should understand - without ceasing to fight it - the error of those who in an excess of despair have asserted their right to dishonour and have rushed into the nihilism of the era. But the fact remains that most of us, in my country and in Europe, have refused this nihilism and have engaged upon a quest for legitimacy. They have had to forge for themselves an art of living in times of catastrophe in order to be born a second time and to fight openly against the instinct of death at work in our history.

Each generation doubtless feels called upon to reform the world. Mine knows that it will not reform it, but its task is perhaps even greater. It consists in preventing the world from destroying itself. Heir to a corrupt history, in which are mingled fallen revolutions, technology gone mad, dead gods, and worn-out ideologies, where mediocre powers can destroy all yet no longer know how to convince, where intelligence has debased itself to become the servant of hatred and oppression, this generation starting from its own negations has had to re-establish, both within and without, a little of that which constitutes the dignity of life and death. In a world threatened by disintegration, in which our grand inquisitors run the risk of establishing forever the kingdom of death, it knows that it should, in an insane race against the clock, restore among the nations a peace that is not servitude, reconcile anew labour and culture, and remake with all men the Ark of the Covenant. It is not certain that this generation will ever be able to accomplish this immense task, but already it is rising everywhere in the world to the double challenge of truth and liberty and, if necessary, knows how to die for it without hate. Wherever it is found, it deserves to be saluted and encouraged, particularly where it is sacrificing itself. In any event, certain of your complete approval, it is to this generation that I should like to pass on the honour that you have just given me.

At the same time, after having outlined the nobility of the writer's craft, I should have put him in his proper place. He has no other claims but those which he shares with his comrades in arms: vulnerable but obstinate, unjust but impassioned for justice, doing his work without shame or pride in view of everybody, not ceasing to be divided between sorrow and beauty, and devoted finally to drawing from his double existence the creations that he obstinately tries to erect in the destructive movement of history. Who after all this can expect from him complete solutions and high morals? Truth is mysterious, elusive, always to be conquered. Liberty is dangerous, as hard to live with as it is elating. We must march toward these two goals, painfully but resolutely, certain in advance of our failings on so long a road. What writer would from now on in good conscience dare set himself up as a preacher of virtue? For myself, I must state once more that I am not of this kind. I have never been able to renounce the light, the pleasure of being, and the freedom in which I grew up. But although this nostalgia explains many of my errors and my faults, it has doubtless helped me toward a better understanding of my craft. It is helping me still to support unquestioningly all those silent men who sustain the life made for them in the world only through memory of the return of brief and free happiness.

Thus reduced to what I really am, to my limits and debts as well as to my difficult creed, I feel freer, in concluding, to comment upon the extent and the generosity of the honour you have just bestowed upon me, freer also to tell you that I would receive it as an homage rendered to all those who, sharing in the same fight, have not received any privilege, but have on the contrary known misery and persecution. It remains for me to thank you from the bottom of my heart and to make before you publicly, as a personal sign of my gratitude, the same and ancient promise of faithfulness which every true artist repeats to himself in silence every day.