Shakespeare

"As if there were some force arranging things in the dark, Mr. Morris Chang’s third uncle, with foresight, first chose a year at Harvard for him, rather than immediately entering the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which most directly matched his specialty. In his year at Harvard, he immersed himself almost in all directions in Western civilization: from Homer, Milton, Shakespeare, Hemingway, Austen, and Shaw, to Churchill’s World War II memoirs and the speeches of successive U.S. presidents; at the same time he subscribed to major American newspapers and periodicals, listened to music, watched theater, visited museums, attended ball games and dances, and made American friends."

"In that one year at Harvard, the amount and breadth of my reading were something I never again matched later. I read Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Galsworthy, Sinclair Lewis, Jane Austen, Shakespeare, and Shaw; Churchill’s memoirs of World War II; famous speeches by modern American presidents; American history; Wells’s world history; several English books about China; and I also ventured into a few classical giants such as Gibbon’s The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Adam Smith’s The Wealth of Nations, and even Marx’s Capital. Besides these major works, I subscribed to two newspapers, The New York Times and The Christian Science Monitor published in Boston, as well as Time magazine."

"I am not saying, as Shakespeare’s Dick the Butcher snipes in *Henry VI, Part 2*, that “the first thing we do, let’s kill all the lawyers.” The system of checks and balances has been, and is, fundamental to the success of the United States. Since the government is capable of wielding terrible power, judges and the law are often the last and best hope against abuses. But the United States will not remain a great power if it caters primarily to the wealthy. Its failure to build enough has hurt working people and makes the country feel like a low-agency society."

"While I don’t socialize much with most business colleagues, Ted and I became fast friends, and over the years we’ve hiked, hunted, fished, and flown together. And here’s the funny part: Ted Turner and I are as different as two people could possibly be. I am an introvert, and I am quiet—for the most part—at meetings. Public speaking for me can be a mild form of punishment. But Ted has the intensity of a revival preacher when he believes in something, pacing the room and occasionally quoting Shakespeare or Alexander the Great to annunciate his points."