All Quotes

"We're constantly being asked all sorts of very profound questions. But we're not very profound people. People say, 'What do you think of the H-bomb, of religion, of fan worship?' But we didn't really start thinking about these things until people asked us. And even then we didn't get much time to consider them. What do I think of the H-bomb? Well, here's an answer with the full weight of five O levels and one A level behind it: I don't agree with it."

"I don't have any desire to learn. I feel it's like a voodoo, that it would spoil things if I actually learnt how things are done."

"While the others had got married and moved out to suburbia, I had stayed in London and got into the arts scene through friends like Robert Fraser and Barry Miles and papers like The International Times. We opened the Indica gallery with John Dunbar, Peter Asher and people like that. I heard about people like John Cage, and that he’d just performed a piece of music called 4’33” (which is completely silent) during which if someone in the audience coughed he would say, ‘See?’ Or someone would boo and he’d say, ‘See? It’s not silence—it’s music.’ I was intrigued by all of that. So these things started to be part of my life. I was listening to Stockhausen; one piece was all little plink-plonks and interesting ideas. Perhaps our audience wouldn’t mind a bit of change, we thought, and anyway, tough if they do! We only ever followed our own noses—most of the time, anyway. ‘Tomorrow Never Knows’ was one example of developing an idea."

"With life and all I've been through, I do have a belief in goodness, a good spirit. I think what people have done with religion is personified good and evil, so good's become God with 'o' out, and evil's become Devil with a 'd' added. That's my theory of religion."

"For cruelty to animals, vegetarianism is the great thing to get rid of that. For the planet, to prevent depleting the water and the land and everything, it’s a great idea. And I think it’s a great thing for your health, and doctors nowadays agree with that. There are plenty of great books and organizations, so no matter where you are, there is someone to help you. That’s your first step, and I think your second step is just look in the supermarket for good vegetarian food, and I think it’s so much more readily available now."

"We thought we'd be really big in Liverpool."

"What a fucking great band we were."

"I tend not to say much on the phone now. If I leave a message, it's benign. You edit yourself according to the new circumstances of the new world. I think it would be quite good to get some sort of laws."

"I'd like to be able to go on holiday and not to have to hold my belly in for two whole weeks."

"Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away Now it looks as though they're here to stay. Oh, I believe in yesterday."

"Why she had to go I don't know, she wouldn't say I said something wrong, now I long for yesterday."

"Yesterday, love was such an easy game to play Now I need a place to hide away. Oh, I believe in yesterday."

"To lead a better life, I need my love to be here. Here, making each day of the year, Changing my life with a wave of her hand. Nobody can deny that there's something there."

"I want her everywhere and if she's beside me I know I need never care. But to love her is to need her Everywhere, knowing that love is to share each one believing that love never dies watching her eyes and hoping I'm always there."

"Lovely Rita, Meter Maid, nothing could come between us. When it gets dark I'll tow your heart away"

"Will you still need me, will you still feed me, when I'm sixty-four?"

"Obladi oblada life goes on bra Lala how the life goes on"

"The long and winding road that leads to your door Will never disappear, I've seen that road before it always leads me here, Leads me to your door."

"I thought the only lonely place was on the moon."

"You'd think that people would have had enough of silly love songs I look around me and I see it isn't so Some people want to fill the world with silly love songs And what's wrong with that? I'd like to know 'Cause here I go again... I love you."

"Ebony and ivory live together in perfect harmony Side by side on my piano keyboard, oh Lord why don't we?"

"Even legendary musician Paul McCartney weighed in. In his foreword to a new book against Arctic drilling by Greenpeace activist Ben Stewart, McCartney wrote, "As the ice retreats, the oil giants are moving in. Instead of seeing the melting as a grave warning to humanity, they are eyeing the previously inaccessible oil beneath the seabed at the top of the world. They're exploiting the disappearance of the ice to drill for the very same fuel that caused the melting in the first place.""

"Among Sir Paul's accomplishments with the Beatles and as a massively successful solo artist, McCartney's talent as a bassist is often downplayed. Music fans of any real level or generation understand what a phenomenal songwriter McCartney was and still is. However, his bass playing on such Beatles' classics as "Nowhere Man," "Come Together," and "A Day in the Life" were innovative for the time. The latter is also an example of just how melodic his playing can be. McCartney's talent on the instrument is worth paying attention to the next time a Beatles tune comes on."

"Her genuine concern for the plight of others and her ability to talk to anybody and make them feel special were her remarkable qualities. Her loss has been felt here very deeply because of the wonderful work she did here with patients. She will be very deeply missed."

"She represented Britain with nobility and warmth and she captured the imagination of millions throughout the world with her dedication to her children and to innumerable worthy causes. Her untimely death is a shock to all who admired her and who will cherish her memory"

"I don't think she ever understood why her genuinely good intentions were sneered at by the media, why there appeared to be a permanent quest on their behalf to bring her down. It is baffling. My own and only explanation is that genuine goodness is threatening to those at the opposite end of the moral spectrum. It is a point to remember that of all the ironies about Diana, perhaps the greatest was this - a girl given the name of the ancient goddess of hunting was, in the end, the most hunted person of the modern age."

"Many exceptional projects that touched the lives of ordinary people have been put into practice in Russia with her direct participation."

"Caring for people who are dying and helping the bereaved was something for which Diana had passion and commitment. When she stroked the limbs of someone with leprosy, or sat on the bed of a man with HIV/AIDS and held his hand, she transformed public attitudes and improved the life chances of such people. People felt if a British princess can go to a ward with HIV patients, then there's nothing to be superstitious about."

"But a new world began, I think, in 1980, with the discovery that Diana, the future Princess of Wales, had legs. You will remember how the young Diana taught for a few hours a week at a kindergarten called Young England, and when it was first known that she was Charles's choice of bride, the press photographed her, infants touchingly gathered around; but they induced her to stand against the light, so in the resulting photograph the nation could see straight through her skirt. A sort of licentiousness took hold, a national lip-smacking. Those gangling limbs were artlessly exposed, without her permission. It was the first violation."

"I always think of my mother in everything I do. I hope she would be proud of my work. My brother and I often ask ourselves: what would our mother have done in this situation? My mother was to me, like my brother, a role model. And also to many people worldwide. I believe people took to her so warmly because she possessed the ability to take away their embarrassment in whatever situation she met them in. She was immediately sympathetic. Exactly like her, I know that I enjoy a privileged position as a member of the royal family and I must use what was given to me to try to make a difference in important topics."

"She was our guardian, friend and protector. She never once allowed her unfaltering love for us to go unspoken or undemonstrated. She will always be remembered for her amazing public work. But behind the media glare, to us, just two loving children, she was quite simply the best mother in the world. We would say that wouldn't we. But we miss her. She kissed us last thing at night. Her beaming smile greeted us from school. She laughed hysterically and uncontrollably when sharing something silly she might have said or done that day. She encouraged us when we were nervous or unsure. She - like our father - was determined to provide us with a stable and secure childhood."

"I think she'd be happy in the way that we're going about it but slightly unhappy about the way the other people were going about it as in saying, 'Look: you're not normal, so stop trying to be normal,' which is very much what we get a lot."

"My mother used her position very well to help other people, as does my father, and I hope to do the same."

"Losing a close family member is one of the hardest experiences that anyone can ever endure. My mother Diana was present at your launch 15 years ago, and today I am incredibly proud to be able to continue her support for your fantastic charity, by becoming your royal patron. Never being able to say the word 'Mummy' again in your life sounds like a small thing. However, for many, including me, it's now really just a word – hollow and evoking only memories."

"See — I have taken England with both my hands."

"Most valiant of men, what availed the power of the Frank king, with all his people, from Lorraine to Spain, against Hastings, my predecessor? What he wanted of the territory of France he appropriated to himself; what he chose, only, was left to the king; what he had, he held during his pleasure; when he was satisfied, he relinquished it, and looked for something better. Did not Rollo, my ancestor, the founder of our nation, with your progenitors, conquer at Paris the king of the Franks in the heart of his dominions; nor could he obtain any respite until he humbly offered possession of the country which from you is called Normandy, with the hand of his daughter? Did not your fathers take prisoner the king of the French, and detain him at Rouen till he restored Normandy to your Duke Richard, then a boy; with this stipulation, that in every conference between the King of France and the Duke of Normandy, the duke should have his sword by his side, while the king should not be allowed so much as a dagger? This concession your fathers compelled the great king to submit to, as binding for ever."

"Ah! let any one of the English whom our predecessors, both Danes and Norwegians, have defeated in a hundred battles, come forth and show that the race of Rollo ever suffered a defeat from his time until now, and I will submit and retreat. Is it not shameful, then, that a people accustomed to be conquered, a people ignorant of the art of war, a people not even in possession of arrows, should make a show of being arrayed in order of battle against you, most valiant? Is it not a shame that this King Harold, perjured as he was in your presence, should dare to show his face to you? It is a wonder to me that you have been allowed to see those who by a horrible crime beheaded your relations and Alfred my kinsman, and that their own accursed heads are still on their shoulders. Raise, then, your standards, my brave men, and set no bounds to your merited rage. Let the lightning of your glory flash, and the thunders of your onset be heard from east to west, and be the avengers of the noble blood which has been spilled."

"I attacked the English of the Northern Shires like a lion. I ordered their houses and corn, with all their belongings, to be burnt without exception and large herds of cattle and beasts of burden to be destroyed wherever they were found. It was there I took revenge on masses of people by subjecting them to a cruel famine; and by doing so — alas!— I became the murderer of many thousands of that fine race."

"He must be judged by his acts, but his acts are sufficiently illuminating. They leave no doubt of his greatness, but they reveal also a man who was harsh and unlovable – perhaps even personally repellent. Most of his life was spent in war, and war brought out what was brutal in this burly warrior whose physical strength (until diminished by corpulence) was exceptional, and who may have looked something like Henry VIII of England. His savagery in war is well attested."

"As a warrior, William was (perhaps inevitably) stained with blood. As a ruler, his avarice was notorious, and his taxation savage. He needed money for his government, and particularly for the numerous mercenaries he employed. The ruthlessness with which he extracted money from England must be set against the good administration he provided... Strong in rule, he was not a tyrant. Contemporaries found him a man to fear, but also a man to respect."

"He was harsh and rapacious, personally pious, courageous in adversity, and indomitably tenacious of purpose. He could suit his policy to opportunity; but his will was inflexible, and his energy was untiring."

"It would, in truth, be difficult to deny to William the Conqueror a place among the greatest monarchs of the Middle Ages. He stands four-square, a dominant figure against the background of his own fascinating and tumultuous age. As a warrior he was widely renowned, and probably justly, for...his patience, his organization and his generalship were surely of the highest order. But it is above all for his constructive statesmanship that he commands attention; and here his achievement must appear all the more remarkable when it is recalled that his ceaseless preoccupation with the problems of government was coupled with ceaseless campaigning... To England he gave a new aristocracy and a reconstituted church. At the same time, he was concerned to respect the traditions of the country he conquered, and he revitalized many of its ancient institutions. He made his own contribution to the highly individual character of medieval England, and Anglo-Norman history in the eleventh century cannot be appraised without reference to his characteristic acts."

"As a mere constellation of talent in different fields Anselm, Gregory VII and William the Conqueror were the greatest men in Europe during this period... William and Gregory were men of action of a kind rare at any time, but almost unknown in the Middle Ages: they were creators who dealt intuitively with confused situations, having little in precedent or business routine or learned construction to guide them. Gregory had an energy of purpose and clarity of vision in practical affairs for which no parallel can be found in these centuries. William had an undaunted mastery of the problems of the secular world—that is to say, of other men's wills—in both fighting and ruling, unapproached in creative power by any other medieval ruler after Charlemagne."

"Better than a play!"

"If we are understood, more words are unnecessary; if we are not likely to be understood, they are useless."

"Mrs. Lane and I took our journey towards Bristol, resolving to lie at a place called Long Marson, in the vale of Esham. But we had not gone two hours on our way but the mare I rode on cast a shoe; so we were forced to ride to get another shoe at a scattering village, whose name begins with something like Long—. And as I was holding my horse's foot, I asked the smith what news? He told me that there was no news that he knew of, since the good news of the beating of the rogues the Scots. I asked him whether there was none of the English taken that joined with the Scots? He answered, that he did not hear that that rogue Charles Stewart was taken; but some of the others, he said, were taken, but not Charles Stewart. I told him, that if that rogue were taken he deserved to be hanged, more than all the rest, for bringing in the Scots. Upon which he said, that I spoke like an honest man, and so we parted."

"We saw, that no Expedient would be entertain'd but that of a total Exclusion, which We had so often declar'd, was a Point, that in Our Own Royal Judgment, so nearly concern'd Us both in Honour, Justice, and Conscience, that We could never consent to it: In short, We cannot, after the sad Experience We have had of the late Civil Wars, that Murder'd Our Father of Blessed Memory, and ruin'd the Monarchy, consent to a Law, that shall establish another most Unnatural War, or at least make it necessary to maintain a Standing Force for the Preserving the Government and the Peace of the Kingdom."

"And who cannot but remember, That Religion, Liberty and Property were all lost and gone, when the Monarchy was shaken off, and could never be reviv'd till that was restored."

"He had been, he said, an unconscionable time dying; but he hoped that they would excuse it."

"Let not poor Nelly starve."