Quotes by Anthony Hopkins
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I read a lot, that's my main hobby. I've got an iPad which I store books on and I read voraciously. I'm a slow reader but I'm obsessive. I make references, underline things, cross-reference. I'm an autodidact.

I never make conscious decisions. If my agent says to me, It's a good script, I'll do it. I don't plan. I've got a lot of things to do. I'm at the roulette table and my luck seems to be running at the moment. I might as well stay there until it runs out.

You look closely enough, you'll find that everything has a weak spot where it can break, sooner or later.

I still don't know what the film was about because all I remember is a whole lot of technical dialogue about a body in a suitcase.

Acting is just a process of relaxation, actually. Knowing the text so well and trusting that the instinct and the subconscious mind, whatever you want to call it, is going to take over.

Hitchcock was such a master of putting on screen things that made you uneasy. Somebody once asked him what frightened him most, and he said the police. He came from a poor background. I think he understood those fears.

I'm not unfamiliar with music, and I really do write music. I've gotten a talent for it. I don't have the technical skills, but I do plan to learn.

When I was a young guy, I knew everything. Now I know very little. I know less and less as the time goes on.

I drank a lot, but I wouldn't have missed it. I look back on it as sort of dreary enjoyment, because I don't have to be there anymore.

I couldn't say I ever dreamt of becoming a composer, a pianist, or anything else for that matter. I have the kind of brain where nothing is set in stone.

Once you accept the fact that there's nothing to fear, you drill into the primal oil well. I believe when we do things without fear, we can do anything. As long as you don't worry about the consequences.

It will be the kiss by which all others in your life will be judged... and found wanting.

My weak spot is laziness. Oh, I have a lot of weak spots: cookies, croissants.

Our existence is beyond our explanation, whether we believe in God or we have religion or we're atheist. Our existence is beyond our understanding. No one has an answer.

I've felt like an outsider all my life. It comes from my mother, who always felt like an outsider in my father's family. She was a powerful woman, and she motivated my father.

I've had no ­contact with my daughter for years. That's her choice. Anyway, you move on. If people don't want to bother with me, fine. You know, God bless them, and move on.

For me, time is the greatest mystery of all. The fact is that we're dreaming all the time. That's what really gets me. We have a fathomless lake of unconsciousness just beneath our skulls.

Multiply it by infinity and take it to the depths of forever, and you will still have barely a glimpse of what I'm talking about.

I'm most suspicious of scripts that have a lot of stage direction at the top of the page sunrise over the desert and masses of a whole essay before you get to the dialogue.

I don't have many friends; I'm very much a loner. As a child I was very isolated and I've never been really close to anyone.

I'm very much a loner. I don't like long relationships with people and I always keep people at a distance.

We're all different. Some people are musicians, some people are actors, some people are agents and some people are accountants... We're all different.

I wouldn't use the word 'scared' for my role as Hitchcock, but it was my most insecure. Taking on such a formidable, giant personality such as Hitchcock; he was one of the great geniuses of world cinema. Sheer genius.

A census taker once tried to test me. I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti.

I was called 'Dumbo,' like the elephant, as a child because I couldn't understand things at school.

I'm having an old friend for dinner.

I do admire Judi Dench and Sir Ian McKellen, but I'm a philistine. I like the good life too much; I'm not good at going on stage night after night and on wet Wednesday afternoons.

If you're an alcoholic or a drug addict, we flirt with death. We pull ourselves to the brink of destruction and if we're lucky we pull ourselves back. We all have that in us.

I love life because what more is there.

I am not very good with relationships. With anyone. I can't be locked up with anyone for too long.

My father wasn't a cruel man. And I loved him. But he was a pretty tough character. His own father was even tougher -- one of those Victorians, hard as iron -- but my dad was tough enough.

I was bullied as a boy -- lots of kids are, but hopefully most of us get on with our lives and grow up.

I don't know why they gave me a knighthood -- though it's very nice of them -- but I only ever use the title in the U.S. The Americans insist on it and get offended if I don't.

I'm not a health freak. I just work out every day.

I think the first British actor who really worked well in cinema was Albert Finney. He was a back-street Marlon Brando. He brought a great wittiness and power to the screen. The best actor we've had.

The Welsh people have a talent for acting that one does not find in the English. The English lack heart.

I was lousy in school. Real screwed-up. A moron. I was antisocial and didn't bother with the other kids. A really bad student. I didn't have any brains. I didn't know what I was doing there. That's why I became an actor.

I'm fascinated by the fact that we can't grasp anything about time.

We all dream. We dream vividly, depending on our nature. Our existence is beyond our explanation, whether we believe in God or we have religion or we're atheist.

I'm interested in the dream and subconscious mind, the peculiar dream-like quality of our lives, sometime nightmare quality of our lives.

I know that some actors and directors like to have intensity on set. I don't, particularly. Certainly, if they want that, that's fine, but I can't work like that.

What I do is just go over and over and over my lines and learn the script so well that I can just be easy and relaxed. That's the way I always work.

I can't stand directors who try to micro-manage everything. When it happens these days I just walk off set, saying if they don't like the way I'm doing it they can get someone else.

A conductor can't be too arrogant with an orchestra and try to impose himself too much.

I've been composing music all my life and if I'd been clever enough at school I would like to have gone to music college.

My philosophy is: It's none of my business what people say of me and think of me.

I'm married. My wife, Stella -- a beautiful woman. She's brought a lot of peace to my life, a lot of wisdom.

My life turned out to be beyond my greatest dreams.

In the theatre, people talk. Talk, talk until the cows come home about journeys of discovery and about what Hazlitt thought of a line of Shakespeare. I can't stand it.

This industry has been really good to me. It's been a great life. I'm not through yet. I'm ready when you are, Mr. DeMille.

Well, everyone likes movies when they're a little kid.

Richard Burton came from the same town as me, so I thought I'd follow my nose, and follow my luck. I think I've been very lucky.

Oh yes. I'm an actor, so I just learn my lines, and show up and do it. I gave it a little bit of thought.

My father was grounded, a very meat-and-potatoes man. He was a baker.

I'm one of the slowest drivers on the road. I mosey along. If you're doing anything too fast, including living life too fast, that creates sudden death. If I have to be somewhere on time, I make sure I leave early enough.

I love life because what more is there?

The art of acting is not to act. Once you show them more, what you show them, in fact is bad acting.

I always had a knack for improvisation. I can write down the notes I play, but never really had a proper academic musical background. I suppose I'm blessed and cursed by the fact I have that freedom.

I tend to get bored quickly, which means I must be boring.

Beware the tyranny of the weak. They just suck you dry.

I spent two years in the military service, then I trudged around in repertory for quite a while. I somehow wound up at the National Theatre, though, and then I was definitely on my way.

We're all caught up in circumstances, and we're all good and evil. When you're really hungry, for instance, you'll do anything to survive. I think the most evil thing -- well, maybe that's too strong -- but certainly a very evil thing is judgment, the sin of ignorance.

I'm a pretty tough guy, you know. I'm a pretty hard man. I've got a lot of compassion, but I don't waste time with people.

I'm most suspicious of scripts that have a lot of stage direction at the top of the page... sunrise over the desert and masses of... a whole essay before you get to the dialogue.

I never make conscious decisions.

I'm devious, cruel, cunning and addictive.

I don't believe in nepotism. I don't much like the idea of parents who interfere.

I don't have many friends; I'm very much a loner. As a child I was very isolated, and I've never been really close to anyone.

I know that the arts are important. I'm not denying that, but I can't associate myself with all the claptrap that goes on around it.

I am able to play monsters well. I understand monsters. I understand madmen.

I tried acting, liked it, and stuck with it. I saw it as the way I would keep that promise to myself of getting back at those who had made my school life a misery.

Life's too short to deal with other people's insecurities.

I have a punishing workout regimen. Every day I do 3 minutes on a treadmill, then I lie down, drink a glass of vodka and smoke a cigarette.

Why love if losing hurts so much? I have no answers anymore; only the life I have lived. The pain now is part of the happiness then.

The magical, supernatural force that is with us every second is time. We can't even comprehend it. It's such an illusion, it's such a strange thing.

I would like to go back to Wales. I'm obsessed with my childhood and at least three times a week dream I am back there.

Relish everything that's inside of you, the imperfections, the darkness, the richness and light and everything. And that makes for a full life.

I think the healthy way to live is to make friends with the beast inside oneself, and that means not the beast but the shadow. The dark side of one's nature. Have fun with it and you know, is to accept everything about ourselves.

My philosophy is it's none of my business what people say of me and think of me. I am what I am, and I do what I do. I expect nothing and accept everything. And it makes life so much easier.

I've got a great sense of humor.

I'm the slowest driver in the world.

I'm always cast in these strange men... that's not me, really.

I worked with Steven Spielberg on Amistad... he seemed so very secure in himself that he let me do things.

I think all those actors from that generation, like Bogart -- they were wonderful actors. They didn't act. They just came on and they did it, and the characters were wonderful.

I love roller coasters. I don't get a chance often, but I've gone to Magic Mountain and gone on the rides. I love roller coasters.

I like the good life too much, I'm not good at going on stage night after night and on wet Wednesday afternoons.

I have dual citizenship, it just so happens I live in America.

I don't know what acting is, but I enjoy it.

I don't have people following me around, like bodyguards. I don't know how people live like that. Maybe the young movie stars have to live like that, I don't know. But it seems a little crazy to me. I don't think you need all that stuff.

I came here in 1974 to do a play, and then I went to L.A. I really like living in America. I feel more at home here than anywhere else.

Every time I try to retire, or even think of retiring from acting, my agent comes up with a script.

And I love a scary movie. It makes your toes curl and it's not you going through it.

Actors I admire? Ed Harris, or course, I think he's terrific; because I know he always had to fight being what he looked like a lot, but I think he's a terrific actor.

I have no interest in Shakespeare and all that British nonsense... I just wanted to get famous and all the rest is hogwash.

I've got no need to prove to myself that I can do Shakespeare. I've done it.

It was a challenge, to work with Oliver Stone.

If I spent all my time criticising myself, I wouldn't be able to function. There are actors who theorise till the cows come home. I haven't the patience for them. It's maybe shallow, but that's why I'll never be part of the acting set.