I knew, of course, that trees and plants had roots, stems, bark, branches and foliage that reached up toward the light. But I was coming to realize that the real magician was light itself.

The use of the term art medium is, to say the least, misleading, for it is the artist that creates a work of art not the medium. It is the artist in photography that gives form to content by a distillation of ideas, thought, experience, insight and understanding.

There is only one optimist. He has been here since man has been on this earth, and that is man himself. If we hadn't had such a magnificent optimism to carry us through all these things, we wouldn't be here. We have survived it on our optimism.

The mission of photography is to explain man to man and each to himself. And that is the most complicated thing on earth.

Anybody who seeks wealth as an end in itself is always going to be disappointed. What you really should be doing is seeking excellence in achievement.

Our politics has been greatly impacted, for the worse, by big money and the concentration of big money.

I took to saying, 'Look, tell you what: Pick it up; open it anywhere. Read three pages. If you can put it down again, I'll pay you a dollar. So I never lost any money on that bet, but I sold a lot of books.

There are three things being a celebrity is good for: raising money for charity, dinner reservations and tee times.