One good reason for writing novels based on your life is that you have something to read in old age when you've forgotten what happened.

I like writing for children. It seems to me that most people underestimate their understanding and the strength of their feelings and in my books for them I try to put this right.

I am not a victim. I am an angry survivor.

All writers are liars. They twist events to suit themselves. They make use of their own tragedies to make a better story... They are terrible people.

All writers are thieves; theft is a necessary tool of the trade.

A writer's work may be a coded autobiography, but only a very close friend could decipher it.

People's lives are in the care of the railways when they get on a train. The railways should remember that.

I met Richard Burton, an RAF cadet on a two-term course. I would have flirted more enthusiastically if it had not been for the horrid boils on the back of his neck.

I like stirring the pot - I think it's part of my duty, to shake people up a bit - make them look at things in a different way.

I dislike the word 'victim.' I dislike being told that I 'lost' my husband - as if I had idly abandoned you by the side of the railway track like an unwanted pair of old shoes.

I wanted to be a war reporter - scrabbling around, exposing things. I didn't want to go to university, I wanted to get a job, but Auntie Beryl said I should go to Oxford.

Dignity does not float down from heaven it cannot be purchased nor manufactured. It is a reward reserved for those who labor with diligence.

I come equipped with stereophonic funk producin´ disco inducin´ twin magnetic rock receptors.

Music is almost mystical to me. It really has an incredibly powerful force.

There are certain things you don't discuss with Ansel, especially if you don't agree.

Possibly, more people kill themselves and others out of hurt vanity than out of envy, jealousy, malice or desire for revenge.

If I were a piano player, I'd play it in the goddam closet.

There is a little bit of me infused in every character I play.

My house used to be haunted, but the ghosts haven't been back since the night I tried on all my wigs.

The bloggers and online donors represent an important resource for the party, but they are not representative of the majority you need to win elections.