No ruler in the history of the world has ever been able to afford a war. They're not affordable things. No prince ever says, 'This is my budget, so this is the kind of war I can have.

The more facts I can have, the better. I can operate very nicely between them, but I am not very good at making things up. I am not sure how ethical it is.

It is almost a joke, but a joke that nobody tells.

Every leader operates under the threat of assassination.

Some readers read a book as if it were an instruction manual, expecting to understand everything first time, but of course when you write, you put into every sentence an overflow of meaning, and you create in every sentence as many resonances and double meanings and ambiguities as you can possibly pack in there, so that people can read it again and get something new each time.

In order to successfully impersonate men, the woman [Margaret Thatcher] launched a war.

[T]he heart is like any other organ, you can weigh it on a scale.