A good bookshop is not just about selling books from shelves, but reaching out into the world and making a difference.

The best tip for writing is just to write; to sit down and write, to begin doing it and not to be scared by the blank page.

Anything seems possible at night when the rest of the world has gone to sleep.

Everybody's got the seam of goodness in them, Kit," said Grandpa. "Just a matter of whether it can be found and brought out into the light.

Writing will be like a journey, every word a footstep that takes me further into undiscovered land.

And what is wrong with playing with words? Words love to be played with, just like children or kittens do!

I sit in my tree I sing like the birds My beak is my pen My songs are my poems.

Words should wander and meander. They should fly like owls and flicker like bats and slip like cats. They should murmur and scream and dance and sing.

We come to a lamp beside the pathway, and suddenly we stop walking, and we start to dance, and we glitter in the shafts of light, like stars, like flies, like flakes of dust.

We have to allow ourselves to see what there is to see, and we have to imagine.

This is our world. Aye, there's more than enough of darkness in it. But over everything there's all this joy, Kit. There's all this lovely, lovely light.

For life, nature is our best teacher.

I couldn’t decide whether it was better to be the art, or the artist.

Baseball got into my blood early and I worked harder at it than anything.

New Zealand totally rejects Japan's proposals to double the number of whales slaughtered in the Southern Ocean

The original vocals had an awful lot of work put into them at the time, and I wasn't really sure that I could better them - I don't know if I have bettered them.

You should have a guy that makes you feel happier, not upset. I don’t think that’s too much to ask for.

I use my hands like a sculptor, to mold and shape the sound I want, to clarify.

Today is truly the Golden Age: gold buys hornor, gold procures love

What would be the use of immortality to a person who cannot use well a half an hour?

It was ingrained in me to be gracious.