I don't think of myself all the time.

I'm very gregarious, but I love being in the hills on my own.

However, I learned something. I thought that if the young person, the student, has poetry in him or her, to offer them help is like offering a propeller to a bird.

But I hang on to books. I love them. I even think they're very nice decor in a room - far better than paintings... That's not quite true!

When I go fishing I like to know that there's nobody within five miles of me.

I said I have no powers of invention. Well, I also have no powers of mimicry.

I used to fish the Border rivers, but nowadays you have to queue up for a shot and I can't stand that.

When I was asked to be Writer in Residence at Edinburgh I thought, you can't teach poetry. This is ridiculous.

And the second question, can poetry be taught? I didn't think so.

There are some friends you don't meet for twenty years and when you meet them again it's as if no twenty years has happened - you're lucky when that happens. I feel the same about books.

It's like breathing in and out to me. It's like having a conversation with someone who isn't there. Because it has to be addressed to somebody - not a particular person, or very rarely.

I am still the sacred spiritual soul.

Treat your friends as you do your pictures, and place them in their best light.

When you've got a mountain to climb you may as well throw everything into the kitchen sink.

Even as she'd been writing it, she wondered if she was using too many exclamation marks, but she was glad she left them in. Nothing says "all is good in the world" like exclamation marks, after all.

Men are liars. We lie about lying if we have to.

No one who deserves confidence ever solicits it.

When I was growing up I had three wishes. I wanted to be a Lindbergh-type hero, learn Chinese, and become a member of The Algonquin Round Table.

If you continually ask yourself, "What's important now?", you won't waste time on the trivial.

No power on earth or in hell can conquer the Spirit of God in a human spirit

Real pain can alone cure us of imaginary ills. We feel a thousand miseries till we are lucky enough to feel misery.