Venetians feel affection and loyalty to their city, rather than to the Italian state.

I never wanted to be rich or successful or famous. I just wanted to be happy and have fun.

So much of contemporary crime fiction is painful to read and obsessed with violence, particularly against women, and I can't read that.

I have always had a particular antagonism for the military.

Italians know about human nature - they understand human nature perhaps better than anyone else does. They know that people are weak and greedy and lazy and dishonest and they just try to make the best of it; to work around it.

I do not take any pleasure whatsoever in being a famous person.

I don't go to the movies because I don't like films.