It's interesting to wake up at 3 in the morning by someone saying they're a reporter and they want to know how you feel. I felt fine, but I said, 'Well, why do you ask?'

I was one of those kids who always thought that we should know how the world works around us

Probably the single most important thing about the Nobel Prize for most people is whether they get the coveted parking space on campus.

You want your mind to be boggled. That is a pleasure in and of itself. And it's more a pleasure if it's boggled by something that you can then demonstrate is really, really true

From our point of view, the most exciting thing would be if we discovered something really fundamental in our understanding was just off a bit - and that now we have a chance to revisit it

As a scientist, you feel a sense of team spirit for your country but you also have a sense of team spirit for the international community.

It seemed like my favourite kind of job - a wonderful chance to ask something absolutely fundamental: the fate of the Universe and whether the Universe was infinite or not