Fishing is not like billiards, in which it is possible to attain a disgusting perfection.

Grab a chance and you won't be sorry for a might-have-been.

When a thing's done, it's done, and if it's not done right, do it differently next time.

You write not for children but for yourself. And if by good fortune children enjoy what you enjoy, why then you are a writer of children's books.

Swallows and Amazons for-ever!

. . perhaps the greatest satisfaction on the first day of the season is the knowledge in the evening that the whole of the rest of the season is to come.

...next to the pleasure of reading a favourite fishing book comes that of persuading a friend to read it too.

Good fishermen know that in talking about fishing, nothing is more interesting than the truth.

Broadly speaking, the short words are the best, and the old words best of all.

One of the most obvious signs of intelligence is not knowledge alone but imagination combined with reason.

Your world may think what it chooses...but really, opinion and gossip count for nothing at all against truth...

I still like my antique clothes.

Embrace an effortless a-line silhouette in the seasons must have indigo shades.

What went wrong? Nothing and everything.

Wealth is thoughts, not things.

When I'm writing a book, sentence by sentence, I'm not thinking theoretically. I'm just trying to work out the story from inside the characters I've got.

I wish you wouldn't make the strings such an important part of your arrangements because frankly they're only a tax dodge!

Mans desires are limited by his perceptions; none can desire what he has not perceived.