David

“It was really about the Vietnam War,” George Lucas said years later of the film he wrote and directed, which carries echoes of the descent of the Roman Republic into monarchy, “and that was the period where Nixon was trying to run for a [second] term, which got me to thinking historically about how do democracies get turned into dictatorships? Because the democracies aren’t overthrown; they’re given away.”
― Francis S. Barry, Back Roads and Better Angels: A Journey into the Heart of American Democracy

“But the artist cannot look to others to validate his efforts or his calling. If you don’t believe me, ask Van Gogh, who produced masterpiece after masterpiece and never found a buyer in his whole life.”
― Steven Pressfield, The War of Art

“People often ask me how I write songs. Honestly, there’s no one method, so I couldn’t walk you through it even if we had all the time in the world. Sometimes lyrics come first, sometimes music. Some songs take thirty minutes to write, others take years. Some are grim chores and others feel like they just fell out of the pocket of a coat I haven’t worn in a while, like a slumbering twenty-dollar bill. I can tell you what it feels like in the songs, though. Songs are part homemade diorama, part gerbil maze, and part eighties music video—location, story arc, and cinematic container. You build all the tiny props inside so lovingly and sometimes they just aren’t to scale, so you have to start over, and it’s crushing. There are tantrums, tears.”
― Neko Case, The Harder I Fight the More I Love You: A Memoir

“In 2001, we had a president who said, ‘This is not about Islam — Islam is a religion of peace,’ and research does show that political leadership makes a difference. If political leaders are using hateful rhetoric, then we see a rise in hate crimes.”
― Francis S. Barry, Back Roads and Better Angels: A Journey into the Heart of American Democracy