There's an unconscious bias in our society: girls are wonderful; boys are terrible. And to be a boy, or young man, growing up, having to listen to all this, it must be painful.

I think a lot of romanticizing has gone on with the women's movement.

All my friends' mothers were appalling women.

I don't think that the feminist movement has done much for the characters of women.

There was a rule, back when I was an education lawyer in Alabama, about visiting public schools: always go on a rainy day so you can see how badly the roofs leak.

We need to drive down requirements for the schools. In the 19th century, we increased the quality of the schools by higher education saying, 'You can't come in unless you have these skills, unless you've taken these courses.' We did that in Wisconsin when I was there, it helped to transform the secondary school system.

We believed that there's no such thing as good art or bad art. Art is art. If it's bad, it's something else. It was a much, much harder line in the '50s and '60s than it is now, because the idea of art education didn't exist - they didn't have a fine arts program when I was a kid.

My mother was born on a tiny farm in County Mayo. She was meant to stay at home and look after the farm while her brother and sister got an education. However, she came to England on a visit and never went back.