"Apparently, one in five people in the world are Chinese. And there are five people in my family, so it must be one of them. It's either my mum or my dad. Or my older brother, Colin. Or my younger brother, Ho-Chan-Chu. But I think it's Colin."

"I was reading a book... 'the history of glue' - I couldn't put it down."

"One of the things I like about when I tour sometimes is that occasionally you'll see a dad there with his 12-year-old son and they're both enjoying it."

"So I was getting into my car, and this bloke says to me 'Can you give me a lift?' I said 'Sure, you look great, the world's your oyster, go for it.''"

"A special kind of beauty exists which is born in language, of language, and for language."

"The study of beauty is a duel in which the artist cries with terror before being defeated."

"Beauty is in the eye of the beer holder."

"I consider myself a pretty good conversationalist, but you wind up being downgraded to idiot status when you don't speak the language!"