I believe in imagination. I did Kramer vs. Kramer before I had children. But the mother I would be was already inside me.
A handful of works in history have had a direct impact on social policy: one or two works of Dickens some of Zola 'Uncle Tom's Cabin' and in modern drama Larry Kramer's 'The Normal Heart.'
Great artists are people who find the way to be themselves in their art. Any sort of pretension induces mediocrity in art and life alike.