Jeffrey Archer Quotes

No time like the present

The worst moment of any campaign is waiting for the sun to rise on the morning of the battle

Never be frightened by those you assume have more talent than you do, because in the end energy will prevail. My formula is: energy plus talent and you are a king; energy and no talent and you are still a prince; talent and no energy and you are a pauper.

When I was deputy chairman I could travel from Glasgow to Edinburgh without leaving Tory land. In a two-week period I covered every constituency in which we had an MP. There were 14. Now we have only one. We appear to have given up.

Making a million legally has always been difficult. Making a million illegally has always been a little easier. Keeping a million when you have made it is perhaps the most difficult of all.

But I certainly made mistakes, for which I regret, I think most human beings in their lifetime make mistakes, mine ended up in two years prison - two very remarkable years from which I learnt a lot.

I want to be your stranger across a crowded room.

I'm not taking any interest in politics. I'm not involved in politics in any way. My life is in writing now.

I learnt a lot about myself, I learnt a lot about other people and the problems they have. If I was lucky enough to live to a hundred, how I will feel about two per cent of my life being that way, I don't know.

A strong man who has known power all his life may lose respect for that power. But a weak man knows the value of strength.

There are defining moments in one's life when you learn about yourself, and you deposit that knowledge in the experience account, so you can draw on it at some later date.

I find I don't learn a lot while I'm talking

I've loved art for more than 30 years.

Energy plus talent and you are a king, energy and no talent and you are still a prince, talent and no energy and you are a pauper

The discipline required for athletics carried through to writing. You call it obsession. I call it discipline. By the way, I see nothing wrong with that.

At the end of my trial, I was rather hoping the judge would send me to Australia for the rest of my life.

A work of art is worth what someone will pay for it.

With torture ,as with making love, foreplay is the all important factor

It is often spur-of-the-moment decisions, sometimes made by others, that can change our whole lives.

I do greatly admire Australian artists.

Well I certainly have learned and I hope I'm moving on and certainly two years of prison was a terrible punishment.

I feel I have had a very interesting life, but I am rather hoping there is still more to come. I still haven't captained the England cricket team, or sung at Carnegie Hall!

I'm passionate again about writing. This is important to me; it's got to be the comeback book.

The popularity of an individual in life often only manifests itself in death.

Whenever you analyse anyone who has had any success and they're in the headlines, you will find they are human and make mistakes. I'm certainly that and I've made a lot of mistakes.

I wrote a million words in the first year, and I could never have done that outside of prison.

Actually, Sydney is my second favourite city on earth, I love Sydney, but this is the greatest.

Exclusive will not be published in book format.

But the thing I felt most strongly about, and put at the end of one of the prison diaries, was education.

While there may not be a book in every one of us, there is so often a damned good short story.

Are parents always more ambitious for their children than they are for themselves?

I am currently doing about 30 charity auctions a year.

It's one of the ironies of mountaineering,' said Young, 'that grown men are happy to spend months preparing for a climb, weeks rehearsing and honing their skills, and at least a day attempting to reach the summit. And then, having achieved their goal, they spend just a few moments enjoying the experience, along with one or two equally certifiable companions who have little in common other than wanting to do it all again, but a little higher.

When I was three, I wanted to be four. When I was four, I wanted to be prime minister.

Chatterers are a menace.

Birth is life's first lottery ticket.

I think when you've lost an election by 179, there's going to be a period of time after eighteen years in government when you can't do anything right, and people just kick you for the sake of it, will never admit they voted Conservative.

we all suffer in our different ways from being prisoners of birth.

And I did wonder - because it's now three years ago since I left prison - whether there would come a time when I would forget it, or it would be in the past as anything else might be - no, it's there every day of my life.

Well I think after leaving prison, and having written three diaries about life in prison, it became a sort of a new challenge to write another novel, to write a new novel.

Some people standby you in your darkest hour while others walk away; only a select few march towards you and become even closer friends.

I was allowed to ring the bell for five minutes until everyone was in assembly. It was the beginning of power.

If you make a deal with a fool, don't be surprised when they act foolishly.

We all make mistakes but one has to move on.

I think my attitude to human beings has changed since leaving prison.

War and Peace maddens me because I didn't write it myself, and worse, I couldn't.

When a book comes out I wonder if one person will buy it. It's agony. Of course it's stupid, but it's agony.

Who Saddam Hussein kills, dies.