To begin with, it's true, she read with trepidation and some unease. The sheer endlessness of books outfaced her and she had no idea how to go on; there was no system to her reading, with one book leading to another, and often she had two or three on the go at the same time.

I can walk. It's just that I'm so rich I don't need to.

Cancer, like any other illness, is a bore.

Have you ever thought, headmaster, that your standards might perhaps be a little out of date? Of course they're out of date. Standards are always out of date. That is what makes them standards.

Remember. You are a physician. You are not a policeman nor are you a minister of religion. You must take people as they come. Remember, too that though you will generally know more about the condition than the patient, it is the patient who has the condition and this if nothing else bestows on him or her a kind of wisdom. You have the knowledge but that does not entitle you to be superior. Knowledge makes you the servant not the master.

A bookshelf is as particular to its owner as are his or her clothes; a personality is stamped on a library just as a shoe is shaped by the foot.

Mark my words, when a society has to resort to the lavatory for its humour, the writing is on the wall.