I asked Mr. Vann which O levels you need to write situation comedy for television. Mr. Vann said that you don't need qualifications at all, you just need to be a moron.

Will you lie to me and promise to read them? Books need to be read. The pages need to be turned.

Yes, I hate it when people call me a 'national treasure'. It takes away your bite and makes you feel like a harmless old golden Labrador.

Love is the only thing that keeps me sane.

I married two weeks after my 18th birthday, far too young, and by the time I was 23 I was a single mother of three small children, Sean, Daniel and Victoria, living in a prefab house.

Most social problems could be helped or prevented if people had more money and practical advice.

I don't know why women are so mad about flowers. Personally, they leave me cold. I prefer trees.

Every time I start a new piece of work, I spend a long while under the duvet thinking I can't do it.

There's only one thing more boring than listening to other people's dreams, and that's listening to their problems.

I think we take it for granted that if you are with your husband after 30 years, then he is the love of your life.

I am from the working class. I am now what I was then. No amount of balsamic vinegar and Prada handbags could make me forget what it was like to be poor.

You cannot face it steadily, but this thing is sure, That time is no healer: the patient is no longer here.

A pen that has clocked up a million words, a lifetime’s memories, is worth more than the centrepiece in a jeweller’s window.

A man is merely to implement the law. He is there not to decide what to implement as we already have the law. We don't have a legislative body.

She was incapable of love for any object not of her own choice and she resented anyone's demand for it.

The power of effecting changes for the better is within ourselves, not in the favorableness of circumstances.

I went to a public high school that had a very small graduating class of 156 students. I lived a relatively normal childhood until I turned probably around 16. Things started to take off career-wise.

My non-violence bids me dedicate myself to the service of the minorities.

Those who think he had lucky breaks are not only unaware of the real story but also fall prey to that sin of the mediocre: bitchiness about others’ success

Sadism is all right in its place, but it should be directed to proper ends.

When you take somebody's quote out of context, which happens all the time, nobody's ever going to go and do the research on their own and figure out that you got it wrong.