When a problem threatens to engulf you, there's nothing like irrelevant detail to keep your head above water.

Never trade a secret, you'll always get the short end of the bargain.

I had two experiences of criminality: one was my conman father, the other was teaching at Eton

Smiley was soaked to the skin and God as a punishment had removed all taxis from the face of London.

The greatest threat to mankind comes from the renunciation of individual scruple in favor of institutional denominators. . . . Real heroism lies, as it always will, not in conformity or even patriotism, but in acts of solitary moral courage. Which, come to think of it, is what we used to admire in our Christian savior

The fact that you can only do a little is no excuse for doing nothing.

How Bush and his junta succeeded in deflecting America's anger from bin Laden to Saddam Hussein is one of the great public relations conjuring tricks of history. But they swung it. A recent poll tells us that one in two Americans now believe Saddam was responsible for the attack on the World Trade Centre.