Margery Allingham

"What a period. What an age to have been alive in. Oh thank God I was born when I was."

"'A quotation's only a short neat way of sayin' somethin' everybody knows, like "It's crackers to slip a rozzer the dropsy in snide."'"

"Once sex rears its ugly 'ead it's time to steer clear."

"There were times when I wished I had been 'prenticed to a different trade. I was putting in seven hours a day on it. It was an odd life I was always hoping that the end of one thriller would not overt…"

"There is something very good in pride of race if you can be satisfied in your heart it is absolutely genuine and is based on things you have see, heard and felt rather than on those you have read."

"Our ideal is the statesman who knows and loves his country and who never makes the mistake of underestimating his employer, either in intelligence or strength."

"Telling the truth is the basis of all classic art."

"We, me and thee and the parson and all the other lads in the village constitute the public, and the politicians are our servants."