The last two decades before the interview became something a subject could publish themselves.
10 people · 219 answers
United States Navy rear admiral; computer scientist; co-designer of COBOL
Recorded · Chicago Tribune, 9 December 1982 (via Quote Investigator) · 1982
Always remember that it's much easier to apologize than to get permission. In this world of computers, the best thing to do is to do it.
Writer and human rights advocate; Nobel Peace Prize laureate, 1986
Recorded · Academy of Achievement · 1996
Sensitivity. Be sensitive in every way possible about everything in life. Be sensitive. Insensitivity brings indifference and nothing is worse than indifference.
Financier; co-founder of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.
Recorded · Academy of Achievement · 1991
When I went through school, I was in a hurry. I was an economics major as an undergraduate, and I was a finance major in graduate school.
United States district judge, Middle District of Alabama, 1955–1979; judge of the Eleventh Circuit
Recorded · American Academy of Achievement · 1991
Study. Be honest. Don’t violate the laws and get in trouble. Get you a good spouse that will support you, because you never stop working and studying.
Cardiothoracic surgeon; founder of the Texas Heart Institute
Recorded · American Academy of Achievement · 1991
You have to be intelligent, and be able to cope with stress. It is a stressful life, both mentally and physically. Those are the qualities to succeed as a surgeon.
Atmospheric chemist; Nobel laureate in Chemistry, 1995
Recorded · Academy of Achievement · 1996
The advice that I would give is try to find something that you like. Try to devote your energies to being very good at it. Try to achieve excellence.
Co-founder and chief executive of Apple; co-founder of NeXT; chief executive of Pixar
Recorded · Business Week · 1998
No. We have a lot of customers, and we have a lot of research into our installed base. We also watch industry trends pretty carefully.
President of Costa Rica, 1986–1990 and 2006–2010
Recorded · The Nobel Foundation · 1987
Seeing that the past dictatorships were only capable of creating misery and crippling hope, how absurd to pretend to cure the evils of one extreme dictatorship by means of its opposite!
President of the Philippines, 1986–1992
Recorded · AmericanRhetoric.com · 1986
I held out for participation in the 1984 election the dictatorship called, even if I knew it would be rigged.
Lawyer and consumer advocate; author of Unsafe at Any Speed
Recorded · Academy of Achievement · 1991
Too many people who go to the best schools, and get great grades, are confronted with a choice of trivial work that is very high paid, and has some sort of surface status, like senior…
President of the Philippines, 1986–1992
Recorded · AmericanRhetoric.com · 1986
My predecessor set aside democracy to save it from a communist insurgency that numbered less than 500. Unhampered by respect for human rights, he went at it with hammer and tongs.
Co-founder and chief executive of Apple; co-founder of NeXT; chief executive of Pixar
Recorded · Wired · 1996
Design is a funny word. Some people think design means how it looks. But of course, if you dig deeper, it's really how it works.
Poet, essayist and translator
Recorded · The Paris Review, Issue 131, Summer 1994 · 1994
I started reading poetry in primary school—Victor Hugo, the romantics, and the Parnassians—they were part of the curriculum.
President of Costa Rica, 1986–1990 and 2006–2010
Recorded · The Nobel Foundation · 1987
Seeing the size of the challenge, no wonder many are prey to discouragement; or that apocalyptic prophets abound, announcing the failures of the fight against poverty, proclaiming the…
Choreographer, dancer and author
Recorded · Academy of Achievement (achievement.org) · 1993
I already knew this, because I had been studying classical ballet for a long time.
Christiane Nüsslein-Volhard, Edmund Hillary, George H. W. Bush, Jimmy Carter, Joyce Carol Oates, Mario Molina, Richard Feynman, Rosa Parks, Steve Jobs, Warren Buffett