One of the hardest things for boys to learn is that a teacher is human. One of the hardest things for a teacher to learn is not to try and tell them.

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.

You don't put your life into your books, you find it there.

Had your forefathers, Wigglesworth, been as stupid as you are, the human race would never have succeeded in procreating itself.

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

Sometimes there is no next time, no time-outs, no second chances. Sometimes it’s now or never.

All the effort went into getting there and then I had nothing left. I thought I'd got somewhere, then I found I had to go on.