“I would say that jazz is my own language.”

When I’m nervous, I stutter, and I had to keep stopping and starting.

I write songs about stuff that I can’t really get past personally – and then I write a song about it and I feel better.

I wouldn’t be with a man who was scared of me, but I don’t think men are scared of me – look at me, I’m tiny. I don’t think I’m capable of putting anyone off. I’m a nice girl.

I’ve never been an idiot – I was a smart girl but I’d do stupid things like go around Asda and nick stuff because my friends told me to. I was a good girl as a teenager.

I can’t be arsed with game players. I’m more ‘I like you, do you like me? Let’s go and do something about it.’ I’m a very straightforward person like that.

If I heard someone else singing like me, I would buy it in a heartbeat.

I only write about stuff that’s happened to me.. stuff I can’t get past personally. Luckily, I’m quite self-destructive.

Here in England, everyone’s a pop star, innit, whereas in America they believe in the term artist.

I’m not a natural born performer.

I just dress like… I’m an old black man. Sorry! Like I’m an old Jewish black man. I just dress like it’s still the ’50s.

I don’t think your ability to fight has anything to do with how big you are. It’s to do with how much anger is in you.

I read a lot when I’m travelling and always have a couple of books on the go.

I’m happiest with my family around me.

I told you I was trouble, you know that I’m no good.

The jazz I love is sweet and pure with raw elements, which is exactly what the good hip-hop is doing now.

Relationship doesn’t remain, We resonate on different flames, I could cut you down again, If you were like all other men, If you were like all other men, I know that I could shut you down again

The Germans and I no longer speak the same language.

The chief virtue that language can have is clarity.

The four most beautiful words in our common language: I told you so.

The chief merit of language is clearness.

The chief merit of language is clearness, and we know that nothing detracts so much from this as do unfamiliar terms.

I am a lover of truth, a worshipper of freedom, a celebrant at the altar of language and purity and tolerance.

I feel it is unnatural and immoral to try to teach science to children in a foreign language They will know facts, but they will miss the spirit.

Books are mute as far as sound is concerned. It follows that reading aloud is a combination of two distinct operations, of two ‘languages.’ It is something far more complex than speaking and reading taken separately by themselves.