Wendy Cope

“I've said what I'm prepared to say in my poems, and then journalists think that you're going to tell them a whole lot more.”

“I've never been more famous than I was, suddenly, in 1986.”

“I like a quiet life.”

“In my case, the long gaps between my books have got quite a lot to do with lack of confidence. A lot of the time when I'm not writing I start thinking I can't do it.”

“I was single for a long time and felt very much alone in the world, and talk of family values upset me very much at that phase in my life, because I used to think: 'What about people like me?'”

“Possibly I've become less funny as I've been happier.”

“I always tell students that writing a poem and publishing it are two quite separate things, and you should write what you have to write, and if you're afraid it's going to upset someone, don't publish it.”

“The interesting thing is that you don't often meet a poet who doesn't have a sense of humour, and some of them do keep it out of their poems because they're afraid of being seen as light versifiers.”

“I have a theory that if you've got the kind of parents who want to send you to boarding school, you're probably better off at boarding school.”

“Bloody Christmas, here again, let us raise a loving cup, peace on earth, goodwill to men, and make them do the washing up.”

“On Waterloo Bridge where we said our goodbyes,the weather conditions bring tears to my eyes.I wipe them away with a black woolly gloveAnd try not to notice I've fallen in loveOn Waterloo Bridge I am trying to think:This is nothing. you're high on the charm and the drink.But the juke-box inside me is playing a songThat says something different. And when was it wrong?On Waterloo Bridge with the wind in my hairI am tempted to skip. You're a fool. I don't care.the head does its best but the heart is the boss-I admit it before I am halfway across”

“I like buying clothes, especially as I get a tax-deductible allowance.”

“Bloody men are like bloody buses —You wait for about a yearAnd as soon as one approaches your stopTwo or three others appear.You look at them flashing their indicators,Offering you a ride.You’re trying to read the destinations,You haven’t much time to decide.If you make a mistake, there is no turning back.Jump off, and you’ll stand there and gazeWhile the cars and the taxis and lorries go byAnd the minutes, the hours, the days.”

“Bloody men are like bloody buses - you wait for about a year and as soon as one approaches your stop two or three others appear.”

“There is some humour in 'Family Values.' I don't want everyone to think it's not going to make them laugh. But there are quite a lot of poems there that aren't funny at all.”

“The day he moved out was terrible – That evening she went through hell.His absence wasn’t a problemBut the corkscrew had gone as well.”

“It wasn’t you, it wasn’t me,Up there, two thousand feet aboveA New York street. We’re safe and free,A little while, to live and love,Imagining what might have been –The phone-call from the blazing tower,A last farewell on the machine,While someone sleeps another hour,Or worse, perhaps, to say goodbyeAnd listen to each other’s pain,Send helpless love across the sky,Knowing we’ll never meet again,Or jump together, hand in hand,To certain death. Spared all of thisFor now, how well I understandThat love is all, is all there is.”

“Write to amuse? What an appalling suggestion! I write to make people anxious and miserable and to worsen their indigestion.”

“I think it's a question which particularly arises over women writers: whether it's better to have a happy life or a good supply of tragic plots.”