The English language is like a broad river on whose bank a few patient anglers are sitting, while, higher up, the stream is being polluted by a string of refuse-barges tipping out their muck.

Fallen leaves lying on the grass in the November sun bring more happiness than the daffodils.

Green leaves on a dead tree is our epitaph-green leaves, dear reader, on a dead tree.

There is no more sombre enemy of good art than the pram in the hall.

We may assume that we keep people waiting symbolically because we do not wish to see them and that our anxiety is due not to being late, but to having to see them at all.

Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.

No city should be too large for a man to walk out of in a morning.

The true index of a man's character is the health of his wife.

There are many who dare not kill themselves for fear of what the neighbours will say.

While thoughts exist, words are alive and literature becomes an escape, not from, but into living.

All charming people have something to conceal, usually their total dependence on the appreciation of others.

Ignorance screens the truth. It is on that screen that people paint pictures and write underneath their labels "god" and "not-god" and "theism.' and "atheism" .

Education is the mother of leadership.

My Range Rover is great for LA. You can take surfboards on it and stick some bikes in the back. And if you kidnap people you could tie them up in the back, there's space for your chloroform.

Heart is what drives us and determines our fate.

People can help us heal, can give us medicine, advice, many forms of help, but nobody can manage our minds for us.

I want to be free... free to develop my art.

Our attitude determines our altitude.

I think it's very healthy to spend time alone. You need to know how to be alone and not be defined by another person.

The obligation on us is to communicate the truth so that it is understood. The belief will take care of itself.

Excellence is a process that should occupy all our days.