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.

I'm all in favour of free expression provided it's kept rigidly under control.

[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.

I lack what the English call character, by which they mean the power to refrain.

What she was finding also was how one book led to another, doors kept opening wherever she turned and the days weren't long enough for the reading she wanted to do.

I write plays about things that I can't resolve in my mind. I try to root things out.

I had no idea of who could play it, no notion really. Then Richard came to see us but I don't think it was decided at that meeting. The trouble is, as soon as you've chosen somebody it obscures anybody else you might have thought of. It's like going to a place that you've never been to before - you've got a picture of it and then you go there and that picture is totally wiped out by the reality.