“Champagne, if you are seeking the truth, is better than a lie detector. It encourages a man to be expansive, even reckless, while lie detectors are only a challenge to tell lies successfully.”

Most things disappoint till you look deeper.

Human nature is not black and white but black and grey.

Champagne, if you are seeking the truth, is better than a lie detector.

People who like quotes love meaningless generalizations.

One has no talent. I have no talent. It’s just a question of working, of being willing to put in the time.

As long as nothing happens anything is possible.

The great advantage of being a writer is that you can spy on people. You’re there, listening to every word, but part of you is observing. Everything is useful to a writer, you see – every scrap, even the longest and most boring of luncheon parties.

Of two hearts one is always warm and one is always cold: the cold heart is more precious than diamonds: the warm heart has no value and is thrown away.

All good novelists have bad memories. What you remember comes out as journalism; what you forget goes into the compost of the imagination.

A petty reason perhaps why novelists more and more try to keep a distance from journalists is that novelists are trying to write the truth and journalists are trying to write fiction.

Media is just a word that has come to mean bad journalism.

She mixes religion with desertion to make it sound noble.

I had never known her before and I had never loved her so much. The more we know the more we love, I thought.

It is one of the strange discoveries a man can make that life, however you lead it, contains moments of exhilaration; there are always comparisons which can be made with worse times: even in danger and misery the pendulum swings.

In human relationships, kindness and lies are worth a thousand truths.

A single feat of daring can alter the whole conception of what is possible.

The biggest test for any cricketer in England is the weather.

I look forward to the challenges.

If your work becomes a source of enjoyment and a challenge, it will never seem like work – it will be fun. If you ever feel that your work is a burden, there is no point carrying on with it.

Regardless of the challenges and obstacles that have been put in front of me, I am staying optimistic about the remainder of the year.

I may have had a lot of luck in my life, but I still need to find a challenge in the game.

You should not remain in your comfort zone; if you want to make it big, you must challenge yourself, get out of your comfort zone, and succeed in doing well outside of your comfort areas.

The hardest challenge is to be yourself in a world where everyone is trying to make you be somebody else.

Life is a song-sing it. Life is a game-play it. Life is a challenge-meet it. Life is a dream-realize it. Life is a sacrifice-offer it. Life is love-enjoy it.