“But there's time yet. The old women of the tribe have almost always been the wiser. If they keep their marbles long enough. Old men forget--or tend to reminisce, and reminisce falsely and sententiously as a rule. We are often very silly in our middle years but we tend to improve”

“If you've not been loved as a child, you don't know how to love a child.”

“The astounding thing about Paula is that she looks like Tess of the D´Urbervilles, and she sounds like Tess of the D´Urbervilles, and she thinks like Tess of the D´Urbervilles and yet she is so different from Tess of the D´Urbervilles. I expect she comes from a different part of Dorset.”

“Present us with a silver cup for something when you're a filthy rich lawyer, I dare say? Yes. You'll be a lawyer. Magnificent memory. Sense of logic, no imagination and no brains.”

“What I don't want is to be called an octogenarian. I saw 'Octogenarian Jane Gardam' and I thought 'Blow me!' I mean, I am, but that's not the point."(Inteview, The Guardian, 8 January 2011)”

“We must not be so ready to fancy ourselves intentionally injured. We must not expect a lively young man to be always so guarded and circumspect. It is very often nothing but our own vanity that deceives us. Women fancy admiration means more than it does.”

“It is very often nothing but our own vanity that deceives us. Women fancy admiration means more than it does.And men take care that they should.”