Exercpt from 'Like a Thousand Suns'

There is a story in ancient India about a sculptor who was so gifted that his statues almost seemed to come to life out of the stone.

Once, lost in admiration over his stone elephants, one of his stdents asked him, "How do you do this? These elephants are more real than real elephants re; you almost hear them trumpeting."

And the sculptor replied, " There's no secret to it. I just go and get a big block of stone, set it up in my studio, and study it very carefully. Then I take my hammer and chisels and slowly, over a number of years, I chip away everything that is not elephant."