I don't have any particular recipe [for developing new proofs] ... It is the reason why doing research is challenging as well as attractive. It's like being lost in a jungle and trying to use all the knowledge that you can gather to come up with some new tricks, and with some luck you might find a way out.
The most important thing is you must put everybody on notice that you’re here and you are for real. I’m not a player that is just going to come and go. I’m not a player that is going to make an All-Star team one time, two times. I’m here to be an all-time great. Once I made that commitment and said, ‘I want to be one of the greatest ever’, then the game became everything for me.
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
The beauty of poetry: that it says what cannot be said.