A biography for Simon Amstellhasn’t been written yet.
“You must love yourself. The reasons you have for not loving yourself, you have made up. Interrogate these false allegations until the beauty of your true self emerges.”
“Normal is invented. The word 'weird' is invented, and used by people who are scared of who they are.”
“There are things I did that I wouldn't do now.”
“All I ever wanted, from maybe the age of 13, was to be on television.”
“In reality, I do not find Justin Bieber attractive.”
“If you focus too much on being liked or respected, it will be difficult for people to like or respect you.”
“You see people who are still there doing things but their souls have disappeared so there's no joy in it anymore, so I'm scared of not listening to the part of me that knows when it's time to stop something and start something new.”
“If there's anything to be said in a broad way about different audiences it's that I live in a major city, and those themes of isolation, protectiveness, loneliness tend to resonate with other people in major cities.”
“I think as much as I talk about humour being a defence mechanism, I'm also really grateful that I developed it, because I now have it as a choice, rather than a panic button. I feel like it's there if I want to use it. It's fun.”
“I don't see the point of doing comedy unless it comes from pain.”
“I am more interested in finding peace than upsetting anyone.”
“There's a freedom of just being new in a place, no matter what that place is.”
“I went to work at the supermarket Tesco for three months. I was a checkout person. I didn't feel like I was connecting with anybody in any kind of profound, human way. And I got told off for not smiling enough. One day I just sort of stopped going.”
“Thanks to people like Lenny Bruce and George Carlin, it's real freedom to do stand-up comedy.”
“הרצון שהעבר יהיה שונה הוא עוד סוג של שנאה עצמית.”
“I don't think I would have been able to exist in any kind of joyful, peaceful way if I hadn't been able to express who I was on a stage.”
“I know that telling the truth frees me of shame and anxiety.”
“It may be best to ignore politicians in the same way that you can avoid films or TV shows that don't express something truthful about humanity.”
“If you are somebody who is going to at some point be revealed as not like everyone else, then to be in an insular community is a problem.”
“Numb' was about depression. Before it was fashionable!”