"Man's naked form belongs to no particular moment in history; it is eternal, and can be looked upon with joy by the people of all ages."

Auguste Rodin (12 Nov. 1840 - 17 Nov. 1917) French sculptor.

"The next major explosion is going to be when genetics and computers come together. I'm talking about an organic computer - about biological substances that can function like a semiconductor."

Alvin Toffler (born 4 October 1928) American writer and futurist.

"He thought the world's heart beat at some terrible cost and that the world's pain and its beauty moved in a relationship of diverging equity and that in this headlong deficit the blood of multitudes might ultimately be exacted for the vision of a single flower."

Cormac McCarthy (born 20 July 1933), American novelist and playwright.

"That strong mother doesn't tell her cub, Son, stay weak so the wolves can get you. She says, Toughen up, this is reality we are living in."

Lauryn Noelle Hill (born 25 May 1975), American recording artist, musician, producer, and actress.

"The principal thing in this world is to keep one's soul aloft."

Gustave Flaubert

(12 December 1821 - 8 May 1880),

French writer who is counted among the greatest Western novelists.

"I'm positive, I was not singing the Devil's music.... The Devil ain't got no music!"

Mavis Staples

(born 10 July 1939),

American R&B/gospel singer and civil rights activist.

"My life will define itself as I live it. The movies will define themselves as I make them. As long as the theme is something I care about at the moment, it's enough for me to start work. Maybe work itself is what my life is about."

Sidney Lumet (25 June 1924 – 9 April 2011),

American director, producer and screenwriter.

"Music is amazing. There's some metaphysical comfort where it allows you to be isolated and alone while telling you that you are not alone... truly, the only cure for sadness is to share it with someone else."

Wayne Coyne (born 13 Jan. 1961), rock 'n' roller, frontman of The Flaming Lips.

"My family don't listen to R&B -- never have, never will. They only listen to gospel. That's where I get my voice from, I got a gospel voice."

Nathaniel Dwayne Hale AKA Nate Dogg

(19 Aug. 1969 - 15 March 2011),

American musician.

"So much to do, so little done, such things to be."

Elizabeth Taylor (27 Feb. 1932 - 23 March 2011), English-born American actress.

"How can you prove whether at this moment we are sleeping, and all our thoughts are a dream; or whether we are awake, and talking to one another in the waking state?"

Plato (427 BC – 347 BC), Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, student of Socrates.

"I do not want people to be very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them a great deal."

Jane Austen (16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817), English novelist.

"I've never been able to plan my life. I just lurch from indecision to indecision."

Alan Sidney Patrick Rickman

(born 21 February 1946), English actor and theatre director.

"As much as the next person, I want to be approved of, but I'm not greedy for that stuff."

Colin Firth (born 10 September 1960), Academy-Award winning English actor.

"She wore her sexuality with an older woman's ease, and not like an awkward purse, never knowing how to hold it, where to hang it, or when to just put it down."

Zadie Smith (born 25 October 1975), English novelist.