"I was taught by my father. He was head of the primary school so I went to his school until I was 11 - I was the youngest of four daughters and we had all been taught by him. But I didn't really enjoy my secondary education that much, probably because I am a very physical person and don't enjoy sitting at a desk all day."

"Running gave me a focus to start looking after myself, to eat properly, and focus on building up my strength."

"But I didn't really enjoy my secondary education that much, probably because I am a very physical person and don't enjoy sitting at a desk all day. I just dragged myself through GCSE and A Levels, so it suited me very much to go on to drama school, which was very active."

"Thomas Jefferson once said, 'We should never judge a president by his age, only by his works.' And ever since he told me that, I stopped worrying."

"The quickest way of ending a war is to lose it."

"If the U.S. Government was a company, the deficit would be $5 trillion because they would have to account by general accepted accounting principles. But actually they encourage government spending, reckless government spending, because the government can issue Treasury bills at extremely low interest rates."

"The very strength of a nation eventually proves to be its weakness."