Each sudden gust of light explains itself as flames, but neither they, nor even bombs redoubled on the hills tonight can quite include me in their fear. – Andrew Motion
I like eating out. I like buying beautiful paintings and being surrounded by beautiful things. I have to finance that life. I can barely afford a pension scheme because I dont make enough money. – Andrew Motion
I deeply adored my mum. She was an extraordinary person, even for the prejudice Im likely to have. She was beautiful, amusing, a tremendous elaborator of things into comic proportions and extravagant in her imagination. – Andrew Motion
I wanted to reimagine the role, in a way that was respectful of its traditional responsibilities but made them part of a wider pattern of poetry about national incidents, events, preoccupations and to spend a great deal of time going to schools trying to demystify poetry. – Andrew Motion
Overcoming the Cold War required courage from the people of Central and Eastern Europe and what was then the German Democratic Republic, but it also required the steadfastness of Western partner over many decades when many had long lost hope of integration of the two Germanys and Europe. – Angela Merkel