If I were at any time to set out on a career of deceit, it would be of Miss Marple that I should be afraid.

A mother's love for her child is like nothing else in the world. It knows no law, no pity, it dares all things and crushes down remorselessly all that stands in its path.

An archaeologist is the best husband a woman can have. The older she gets the more interested he is in her.

I don't think necessity is the mother of invention. Invention, in my opinion, arises directly from idleness, possibly also from laziness - to save oneself trouble.

It is ridiculous to set a detective story in New York City. New York City is itself a detective story.

Very few of us are what we seem.

Dogs are wise. They crawl away into a quiet corner and lick their wounds and do not rejoin the world until they are whole once more.

Nobody knows what another person is thinking. They may imagine they do, but they are nearly always wrong.

Fear is incomplete knowledge.

Books are a habit-forming drug.

I like living. I have sometimes been wildly, despairingly, acutely miserable, racked with sorrow, but through it all I still know quite certainly that just to be alive is a grand thing.

Forgive me for being the stupidest man on the planet?”“Careful. You’re talking about the man I love.

To every difficulty, God’s grace abounds.

Still waters run deepest, they used to tell me.

When your army has crossed the border, you should burn your boats and bridges, in order to make it clear to everybody that you have no hankering after home.

I think that every man is afraid of his wife.

Fornication: but that was in another country; And besides, the wench is dead.

If Adam had had a real hairy back, we probably wouldn't be here today.

Nothing is going to be handed to you -- you have to make things happen.

Everyone has dreams. But it is what you do with these dreams that is important. Dreams, once you make the decision to act on them can become reality.

I've never known a time when the in-fighting in the Labour Party was so bitter.