“I had thought for years, probably 30 or 40 years, that it would be a lot of fun to try my hand at a classic English mystery novel.”

Growing up in a Canadian household that was more British than Big Ben,

It makes passable Bath buns. But inspiration from within is like a volcano: It changes the face of the world.

I dreamed of flying to England myself and visiting the places my family never tired of talking about.

As I stood outside in Cow Lane, it occurred to me that Heaven must be a place where the library is open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. No … eight days a week.

I always woke up before the plane landed.

I am often thought of as being remarkably bright, and yet my brains, more often than not, are busily devising new and interesting ways of bringing my enemies to sudden, gagging, writhing, agonizing death.

All of it! – was held together by invisible chemical bonds, and I found a strange, inexplicable comfort in knowing that somewhere, even though we couldn’t see it in our own world, there was a real stability.

One that cackles at these capers and another that never gets much beyond a rather jaded and self-conscious smile, like the Mona Lisa.

Liberals have always been the most fervent Imperialists.

Not very good with death? Father was a military man, and military men lived with death; lived for death; lived on death. To a professional soldier, oddly enough, death was life.

I grew up in a very British family who had been transplanted to Canada, and my grandmother’s house was filled with English books.

Whenever I’m out-of-doors and find myself wanting to have a first-rate think.

During a long career in TV broadcasting, I spent a lot of time contributing to other people’s creations.

Anyone who knew the word slattern was worth cultivating as a friend.

If you remember nothing else, remember this: Inspiration from outside one’s self is like the heat in an oven.

The spectrum on the list is very broad. It includes leftists who think that whiny liberals should be stuffed in a sack and drowned.

The cat is classic whilst the dog is Gothic – nowhere in the animal world can we discover such really Hellenic perfection of form, with anatomy adapted to function, as in the felidae.

There are no classes in life for beginners; right away you are always asked to deal with what is most difficult.

In the classic old business cycle, there would be a diminution in sales; it would take a little while for this information to reach corporate headquarters.

Definition of a classic: a book everyone is assumed to have read and often thinks they have.

You know about the fantasies related to the classics, but there is no real discussion about today’s life and no discussion of the real conditions – which is really sickening.

They’re classic themes, which is why I think it’s such a great story to look at again.

I like the classic Mexican style.

I still think the best classic meal in New York is a coffee-shop breakfast – you sort of can’t skip it.