“But I do like Scotland. I like the miserable weather. I like the miserable people, the fatalism, the negativity, the violence that's always just below the surface. And I like the way you deal with religion. One century you're up to your lugs in it, the next you're trading the whole apparatus in for Sunday superstores. Praise the Lord and thrash the bairns. Ask and ye shall have the door shut in your face. Blessed are they that shop on the Sabbath, for they shall get the best bargains. Oh yes, this is a very fine country.”

“You know i don't like you, right?""You've made that very clear, yes." said Magwich."Well" Charles continued, "whenever we've met, you've demonstrated all the qualities i don't want to have. And I try to better myself so I don't become like you. So in a way...""My bad example is making you a better person?" finished Magwich."something like that." said Charles. "If it wasn't for people like you, I don't think I would try so hard. And honestly, you're the worst i've ever encountered." "Oh, you're just saying that." said Magwich. "No, I really mean it.”

“I feel that life is divided into the horrible and the miserable. That's the two categories. The horrible are like, I don't know, terminal cases, you know, and blind people, crippled. I don't know how they get through life. It's amazing to me. And the miserable is everyone else. So you should be thankful that you're miserable, because that's very lucky, to be miserable.”

“Piers looked up at him. 'You're new. What's your name?' 'Neythen, my lord.''Sounds like a terrible illness. No, more like a bowel problem. I'm sorry, Lord Sandys, your son has contracted neythen and won't live a month. No, no, there's nothing I can do. Sandys would have preferred hearing that to syphilis.”

“[M]ost people go through life a wee bit disappointed in themselves. I think we all keep a memory of a moment when we missed someone or something, when we could have gone down another path, a happier or better or just a different path. Just because they're in the past doesn't mean you can't treasure the possibilities ... maybe we put down a marker for another time. And now's the time. Now we can do whatever we want to do.”

“Why do I always feel like you're trying to staple my umbilical cord to the corner of your desk?”

“Interviews seem like such artificial situations, everyone on their best behavior trying desperately to hide behind a professional facade. Did my face fit? I shall have to wait and see.”