My skin is dead good. I think it must be a combination of being in love and Lucozade.

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.

This is beauty, love, and truth all rolled into one. This is joy. And now that I've found it, how can I give it up? Life and work are the most wonderful things a man can have.

God made me on a morning when he had nothing else to do.

When I was still a rather precocious young man, I already realized most vividly the futility of the hopes and aspirations that most men pursue throughout their lives.

For me, the single word "God" suggests everything that is slippery, shady, squalid, foul, and grotesque.

We're not all evil or all good, and we all make mistakes to one degree or another.

Public toilets have a duty to be accessible, poetry does not.

My parents weren't extremely successful financially, but they were happy people. They gave me confidence.

Of course, my family has been a big reason for me to come back, especially my son who loves the game of hockey - he was a big reason for me coming back.

As someone remarked, when told the new atomic bombs would explode without a bang, "they can't leave anything alone."

Inductive inference is the only process known to us by which essentially new knowledge comes into the world.