I was a philosophy major as an undergraduate, and I'm just an arrogant little thing. It's hard for me to admit that I can't understand something, let alone not be in charge of it.

Success has affected my self-definition in that I have more money. Writers pooh-pooh that idea, but it's a huge deal.

I think being tortured as a virtue is a kind of antiquated sense of what it is to be an artist. It comes out of that Symbolist idea, back to Rimbaud and all that disordering of the senses and all of that being some exalted state. When I've been that way, I've always been less exalted than I would have liked.

Having a great dad probably permitted me to pal around with guys in a way that some women don't.

Education, particularly higher education, will take Africa into the mainstream of globalization.

There are no tests similar to SATs to tell us how much undergraduates know. State legislators, who appropriate billions of dollars each year to higher education, are naturally interested in finding out what they are getting for their money.

Education technology is very important because we have a massive challenge in public schools.

The music industry is something that I'm still trying to understand. With acting, I've been doing it for so long that I understand every aspect of it for the most part - there are obviously still more aspects that I need to learn - but I have a grasp on it. With music, I'm still learning. I'm still getting used to it.