Above literature?' said the Queen. 'Who is above literature? You might as well say one was above humanity.

The longer I practise medicine, the more convinced I am there are only two types of cases: those that involve taking the trousers off and those that don't.

...she felt about reading what some writers felt about writing: that it was impossible not to do it and that at this late stage of her life she had been chosen to read as others were chosen to write.

[B]riefing is not reading. In fact it is the antithesis of reading. Briefing is terse, factual and to the point. Reading is untidy, discursive and perpetually inviting. Briefing closes down a subject, reading opens it up.

Authors, she soon decided, were probably best met within the pages of their novels, and were as much creatures of the reader's imagination as the characters in their books. Nor did they seem to think one had done them a kindness by reading their writings. Rather they had done one the kindness by writing them.

At eighty things do not occur; they recur.

No mention of God. They keep Him up their sleeves for as long as they can, vicars do. They know it puts people off.