Quotes by David Mamet

“We must have a pie. Stress cannot exist in the presence of a pie.”

“It's only words... unless they're true.”

“Every scene should be able to answer three questions: "Who wants what from whom? What happens if they don't get it? Why now?”

“Kraus asks the question of Freudian analysis: What would be enough? At what point would talking about ones problems for x hours a week, be sufficient to bring one to a state of normalcy?The genius ...”

“In the meantime: (1) be direct; (2) remember that, being smarter than men, women respond to courtesy and kindness; (3) if you want to know what kind of a wife someone will make, observe her around ...”

“Society functions in a way much more interesting than the multiple-choice pattern we have been rewarded for succeeding at in school. Success in life comes not from the ability to choose between the...”

“What is our life: (Pause.) its looking forward or its looking back. And thats our life. Thats it. Where is the moment?”

“All drama is about lies. All drama is about something thats hidden. A drama starts because a situation becomes imbalanced by a lie. The lie may be something we tell each other or something we think...”

“The leaf of the camomile, parboiled in water, conduces to calm. And yet I do not worship it.”

“You know, I once read an interesting book which said that, uh, most people lost in the wilds, they, they die of shame. Yeah, see, they die of shame. 'What did I do wrong? How could I have gotten my...”

“We're all put to the test... but it never comes in the form or at the point we would prefer, does it?”

“If I could go back would I do it differently? Well, I can't go back.”

“Life in the movie business is like the beginning of a new love affair: it's full of surprises, and you're constantly getting fucked.”

“Every reiteration of the idea that _nothing matters_ debases the human spirit.Every reiteration of the idea that there is no drama in modern life, there is only dramatization, that there is no trag...”

“The basis of drama is ... is the struggle of the hero towards a specific goal at the end of which he realizes that what kept him from it was, in the lesser drama, civilization and, in the great dra...”

“We live in oppressive times. We have, as a nation, become our own thought police; but instead of calling the process by which we limit our expression of dissent and wonder censorship, we call it co...”

“...My dad, may he rest in peace, taught me many wonderful things. And one of the things he taught me was never ask a guy what you do for a living. He said "If you think about it, when you ask a guy...”

“War is tragedy. The great war stories are tragedies. It's the failure of diplomacy. 'War and Peace,' 'A Farewell to Arms,' 'For Whom the Bell Tolls.' Those are some of the greatest tragedies.”

“I understand that computers, which I once believed to be but a hermaphrodite typewriter-cum-filing cabinet, offer the cyber literate increased ability to communicate. I do not think this is altoget...”

“Old age and treachery will always beat youth and exuberance.”