Antonia Fraser

“People in my books tend to get their just deserts, even if not at the hands of the police.”

“King Charles II liked women's company and well as making love to them.”

“The clue to book jacket photography is to look friendly and approachable, but not too glamorous.”

“That is my major concern: writers who are in prison for writing.”

“I hate the only one of my book jackets when I was made up professionally, my hair made into a smooth bell.”

“Ninety-seven is my lucky number.”

“[In 16th century European society] Marriage was the triumphal arch through which women, almost without exception, had to pass in order to reach the public eye. And after marriage followed, in theory, the total self-abnegation of the woman.”

“Darnley, who, like Banquo's ghost, seemed to play a much more effective part in Scottish politics once he was dead than when he was alive.”

“I'm very interested in good and evil and the moral natures of people.”

“My mother, who was quite sharp when I was young, became utterly mild.”

“As long as you persecute people, you will actually throw up terrorism.”

“I think there's a tremendous split between people who've been through a war and people who haven't.”

“Lives in previous centuries for women are largely a matter of class. It would have been fun to have been a rich, privileged woman in the 18th century, but no fun at all to be her maid.”

“I think mine is the fullest and most plausible account of what went on in Marie Antoinette's life.”

“Normally I make myself swim, do exercises. For zest I like going to the cinema.”

“We are privileged. There are poor people out there. We must to do something to make them privileged.”

“The concentration in my book on Marie Antoinette's childhood and on her family influences. It is surprising how some books actually start with her arrival in France!”

“I can't read historical fiction because I find the real thing so much more interesting.”

“Mary Queen of Scots was my first love, and that is always something special.”

“I'm glad I was never an heiress.”