I wish I was a more adventurous person in a way. But actually, security is a really big deal for me.

I can't spend the rest of my life being pretty in a bonnet.

My alter egos have changed a lot over the years. When I was a child, I was a black horse called Storm. Whinnying and jumping over bamboo poles in the garden took up pretty much my entire childhood.

Female ambition is such a complicated thing to play because it is an aggressive quality, and people respond very badly to women exhibiting any kind of aggression.

I can only do something that my sister or my daughter, if I have one, could watch and feel positive about.

I don't really want to do things that I feel like are going to send out a message that I don't really want to sign up for.

I realise there's an innate paradox in promoting oneself on the one hand and saying, 'Oh, I don't want to be famous,' on the other.

We live in a society where children are expected to become adults overnight.

Motherhood so often comes in conflict with women's capacity to express and live their own lives.

I have always been interested in gender politics, so I'm not that keen on doing things that don't represent a truth about women.

I just don't believe you're capable of being an actor unless you have a desire to experience your emotions in a public way.

Adapt to any situation.

What is important is to spread confusion, not eliminate it.

I thought you were sane," I said, "but you're just as crazy as the rest of them.

There's nothing particularly wrong with being more pessimistic than optimistic. Optimism is broad-based, non-detail-oriented thinking; pessimism is detail-oriented thinking.

I like to control my own personal life.

Worries find you easily enough without inviting them.

How do I know that there is a God? In the same way that I know, on looking at the sand, when a man or beast has crossed the desert - by His footprints in the world around me.

Prayer is - listening for the still small voice of God. Listening with the "ear of our hearts."

I love all beauteous things, I seek and adore them

One of the reasons I wanted to teach deaf children was because it made me very sad that they spoke so clumsily and that they moved with less grace that I knew was possible of deaf people.