It all started when my dog began getting free roll over minutes.

That was the day I began cutting classes and returning to TV tapings it ultimately led to a friendship with Johnny O and an increasing fascination and respect for what he did.

I think it's important to have closure in any relationship that ends - from a romantic relationship to a friendship. You should always have a sense of clarity at the end and know why it began and why it ended. You need that in your life to move cleanly into your next phase.

History is full of examples of people who clamp down after they began to enjoy too much freedom. Freedom can lead to instability anarchy and confusion. So there can be a moral counter-revolution.

I heard about the project over a year before we began. My American agent said 'Oh you might want to read 'In Cold Blood' because they're talking about you for Capote but the script's with Johnny Depp and Sean Penn at the moment.' So these things take their time to dribble down the food chain.

What we now call 'finance' is I hold an intellectual perversion of what began as warm human love.

Only weeks after Oslo began when nearly all the world and most of Israel was drunk with the idea of peace I argued that a Palestinian society not constrained by democratic norms would be a fear society that would pose a grave threat to Israel.

I began to fear that Mos Def was being treated as a product not a person so I've been going by Yasiin since '99. At first it was just for friends and family but now I'm declaring it openly.

In this life struggle here I am among you fully cognizant that a true believer has no fear of what God has ordained for him. Those who are visited by fear live only for their present under the illusion that the world began with them and will end with their departure.

When I came to New York I began to meet the people who became the most famous artists of our time. I was insecure about my own level of ability I didn't know whether I could compete with these people and at the same time. I was wondering what is this anyway?