Writing a novel is not merely going on a shopping expedition across the border to an unreal land: it is hours and years spent in the factories the streets the cathedrals of the imagination.

I get so frustrated when people tell me it's unrealistic to create an eight-month emergency savings fund or have money saved for a home down payment or pay off their $5 000 credit card balance.

I just think it would be unrealistic to suggest we're going to eliminate every last domestic insurgent in Afghanistan. Certainly the history of the country would indicate that's not a very realistic objective and I think we have to have realistic objectives.

The great enemy of the truth is very often not the lie deliberate contrived and dishonest but the myth persistent persuasive and unrealistic.

I think that we could be more careful about what we're saying to young women in terms of their expectations. It's unrealistic to expect people to always be in designer clothes. Girls growing up deserve more freedom in how they look and how they feel about how they look.

The dream is real my friends. The failure to realize it is the only unreality.

I am kind of a private person so I don't miss that part of show business at all. Looking back on my career in television and making a movie like 'The Sound of Music' from an adult point of view it actually seems kind of unreal. I was involved in shows that people grew up with - that hold memories for them - and it's a cool feeling.

The advice of the elders to young men is very apt to be as unreal as a list of the hundred best books.