What were once only hopes for the future have now come to pass; it is almost exactly 13 years since the overwhelming majority of people in Ireland and Northern Ireland voted in favour of the agreement signed on Good Friday 1998, paving the way for Northern Ireland to become the exciting and inspirational place that it is today.

Like all the best families, we have our share of eccentricities, of impetuous and wayward youngsters and of family disagreements.

I have to be seen to be believed.

In the turbulence of this anxious and active world many people are leading uneventful, lonely lives. To them dreariness, not disaster, is the enemy. They seldom realize that on their steadfastness, on their ability to withstand the fatigue of dull repetitive work, and on their courage in meeting constant small adversities depend in great measure the happiness and prosperity of the community as a whole. ... The upward course of a nation's history is due in the long run to the soundness of heart of its average men and women.

It has perhaps always been the case that the waging of peace is the hardest form of leadership of all.

I should like to be a horse.

[Before each of numerous portrait sittings:] Now then, with teeth or without?