Peter Shaffer

Tragedy, for me, is not a conflict between right and wrong, but between two different kinds of right.

I discover what I mean as I write. That can be both terrifically exciting and very dangerous, because when you look at your words later, you wonder, 'Did I really mean that, or am I just making verbal patterns?'

Things rust, you know, like the heart. My cardiologist said, 'It's a pump; use it - that's the sole advice I've got to give you.' It's the same in playwriting. Don't theorise about it. Do it.

Rehearsing a play is making the word flesh. Publishing a play is reversing the process.

The Normal is the good smile in a child’s eyes - all right. It is also the dead stare in a million adults.