“My father opened a restaurant. It's so amazing... it's so freaking delicious, but I'm telling you I gain five pounds every time I go in there.”

“What I've discovered is that in art, as in music, there's a lot of truth-and then there's a lie. The artist is essentially creating his work to make this lie a truth, but he slides it in amongst all the others. The tiny little lie is the moment I live for, my moment. It's the moment that the audience falls in love.”

“I was doing these performance art pop music pieces in the city. And they were a bit on the eccentric side I suppose. So people started to call me Gaga after the Queen song 'Radio Gaga.'”

“Every bit of me is devoted to love and art. And I aspire to try to be a teacher to my young fans who feel just like I felt when I was younger. I just felt like a freak. I guess what I'm trying to say is I'm trying to liberate them, I want to free them of their fears and make them feel that they can make their own space in the world.”

“I am a walking piece of art every day, with my dreams and my ambitions forward at all times in an effort to inspire my fans to lead their life in that way.”

“I guess you could say I devoted myself so strongly to my music that for awhile I forgot about my family. But I only get one set of parents, and I think I forgot about that for a little while.”

“I just want my family to be safe. Because I am sometimes polarizing, I fear for their safety.”

“What I've learned is that you really don't need to be a celebrity or have money or have the paparazzi following you around to be famous.”

“I don't like Los Angeles. The people are awful and terribly shallow, and everybody wants to be famous but nobody wants to play the game. I'm from New York. I will kill to get what I need.”

“I do yoga, I do Bikram and I run, and I eat really healthy.”

“I hope that what you take away from my album is not just the music - which I did want to be fun, and I did want it to be about individuality, but please also take away from it that there's no dream that's too big.”

“I hope when I'm dead I'll be considered an icon, though.”

“What I've discovered is that in art, as in music, there's a lot of truth-and then there's a lie. The artist is essentially creating his work to make this lie a truth, but he slides it in amongst all the others. The tiny little lie is the moment I live for, my moment. It's the moment that the audience falls in love.”

“It sometimes makes people feel better about themselves, you know, to put other people down, or make fun of them, or maybe make mockery of their work and that doesn't make me feel good at all.”

“When you're around me and really see that all I do is live and breathe for my work, it's not strange, it's just Gaga.”

“I work very hard, but when God opens that door for you - when life opens that door for you, I should say - I think it's important to be giving, to return the love back.”