“I observe that there is a good deal of German music on the programme, which is rather more to my taste than Italian or French. It is introspective, and I want to introspect.”

“It is introspective, and I want to introspect.”

“To God I speak Spanish, to women Italian, to men French, and to my horse - German.”

“To my taste, the men in Rome are ridiculously, hurtfully, stupidly beautiful. More beautiful even than Roman women, to be honest. Italian men are beautiful in the same way as French women, which is to say-- no detail spared in the quest for perfection. They’re like show poodles. Sometimes they look so good I want to applaud.”

“The inertia of the mind urges it to slide down the easy slope of imagination, rather than to climb the steep slope of introspection.”

“French is the most beautiful,” he said, “and Italian is the most poetic, and Russian the most powerful, German the most solid. But more business is done in English than in any other.”