Economics as a discipline has in effect become the study of capitalism. The two are taken as the same subject.

We wouldn't care so much what people thought of us if we knew how seldom they did.

You heard people say forty was the new thirty and fifty was the new forty and sixty was the new forty-five, but you never heard anybody say eighty was the new anything. Eighty was just eighty.

The standard personality type for a writer is a shy megalomaniac.

The City is, in terms of its basic functioning, a far-off country of which we know little.

The person doing the worrying experiences it as a form of love; the person being worried about experiences it as a form of control.

But knowing that you had gone wrong, and knowing how you had gone wrong, were not the same thing as knowing how to put it right.

In other words, RBS had its origins in a failed speculation, a bail-out, and a financial crash so big it helped destroy Scotland's status as a separate nation.

The seven Ps: Proper Planning and Preparation Prevent Piss-Poor Performance

It's as if people used the invention of seat belts as an opportunity to take up drunk driving.

People would rather earn 60 grand in an area where their neighbours earn 40, than earn 80 in an area where their neighbours earn a hundred.

Good Enough

I try to avoid stories that end with...and he was never seen again.

Now, when it's time to get down to business, I get down to business.

I don't only write about English literature; I also write about chaos theory and... ants. I can understand ants.

The marathon is an opportunity for redemption. Opportunity, because the outcome is uncertain. Opportunity, because it is up to you, and only you, to make it happen.

I have remarked very clearly that I am often of one opinion when I am lying down and of another when I am standing up.

Peace beings with me. The more peaceful I am inside, the more peace I have to share with others.

You want to love unconditionally everything you do, or don't do it.

He flipped the dail, and I crossed my arms over my chest as some vaguely European-sounding band sang about how video had killed the radio star. I wished someone would kill this radio.

Self-pity is the simplest luxury.