Цитаты из книг — Дэвид Митчелл

There’s something fishy about Google’s motto, “Don’t Be Evil.” I’m not saying it’s controversial but it makes you think, “Why bring that up? Why have you suddenly put the subject of being evil on the agenda?” It’s suspicious in the same way as Ukip constantly pointing out how racist they’re not – which my colleague…

At times of crisis and doubt, we crave certainty. I really envy everyone who’s certain that the best way of countering the threat of Islamist terrorism is definitely to bomb Isis. Equally, I envy everyone who’s certain that the best way of doing that is definitely not to bomb Isis. The two groups’ total certainty is all…

Whether consciously or not, some healthy eaters’ healthy eating is primarily an expression of control, cleanliness and virtue. It doesn’t just make them feel better, it makes them feel better than other people. If eating steamed broccoli is suddenly no hardship, because it can be made to taste like baked Alaska, they’re…

There’s a tiny bit of justice in that decision, but so tiny it insults the very concept. Only a homeopath could believe that such a microscopic quantity of justice could have any beneficial effect.

It’s good to do a picture of something bad, that’s the rationale. It helps, like an x-ray of a tumour. It’s better to know. It highlights the rhinos’ plight and, as we all know, raising plight awareness is a major way of making a real difference. Sometimes I think I should get an OBE for my retweeting alone.

One of the most worrying symptoms of the current malaise is that people often ask me what I think is going on. I am just a comedian who writes a humorous newspaper column, and am therefore the wrong person to ask. But I suspect the people who ask me didn’t ask me first – which means they got unsatisfactory answers from…

No wonder we talk about our online echo chambers, where everyone seems to agree with each other and any transgression from a range of approved views is jumped upon and the transgressor shamed. Social media corrals people into interacting solely with those who share their viewpoint more effectively than the court of…

That’s my problem with new-age stuff. In common with many irrational views it harks back to a sense of something ancient while rejecting anything provably historical. It’s like the miserable concept of Original Sin. There seems to be an obsession with the idea that there were ancient humans, uncorrupted by their…

These people, I’m afraid, include those who suffer from ‘wheat intolerance’. I know there is such a thing, which can afflict even the sturdiest, most no-nonsense of souls and causes the consumption of foods containing wheat to bring on unpleasant symptoms that, while not at the same level as an allergic reaction, the…

I wanted to say: ‘Look, do you want me to actually be Richard Slater? Is that your big idea? Because, I’d say, overall I prefer me to Richard Slater and I think you do too. You don’t get to cherry-pick the good aspects of Richard Slater and add them to all my stuff. You take the Slater swimming but you’ll be stuck with…

We’re sliding into a society where the first thing you need to do to demonstrate that you’re any good at something is to say that you are. Under the old rules, boasts were assumed empty until proved otherwise. You had to impress with your actions, draw attention to yourself subtly without being seen to do so. It’s a hell…

Another example of their hatefulness while my dander’s up: in order to get themselves off the hook of sometimes liking uncool things, they refer to them as ‘guilty pleasures’, which is a ridiculous expression. What? So you like Abba, or Roger Moore as James Bond, but have been led to believe that this taste is somehow…

The question the kids of the future will be trying to answer is: “What caused all that suffering?” As a former lazy history student myself, I know that the trick here is to look for the point in the debate where someone says, “It’s a bit more complicated than that,” and then go back to the previous assertion. The things…

The Russians have their answer: bare-chested aggression is what floats their boat. The merciless sturgeon-eyed tyrant. The Russians don’t want to vote for the kind of sap who wouldn’t rig the election if they didn’t. After centuries of dysfunctional relationships with their leaders, they’ve given up resisting: the fact is…

Conservative business minister Michael Fallon attempted to capitalise on Ukip embarrassment over Silvester’s remarks by saying that “there clearly are one or two fruitcakes still around there”. Fair point, but he’s forgetting that many of these people used to be Tory fruitcakes. The Conservatives are losing the fruitcake…

The Chilcot inquiry probably makes Clegg nostalgic, too. It conjures up the Iraq war, which brings back happy memories for Nick. Those were his glory days of being right about stuff and ignored, before he moved into the treacherous arena of being wrong about stuff and obeyed.

A recent newspaper advertisement for Ryanair has a big picture of Robert Mugabe shaking his fist, under the headline: “Here’s EasyJet’s New Head of Punctuality”. This sends out a confused message. I’m no Zimbabwe expert but I’m fairly confident that the main charge levelled against Mugabe isn’t one of unpunctuality. It’s…

The first big roar for a joke you’ve written yourself is the best laugh you’ll ever get in your life, the rest of which you spend trying to recapture it.

No one has ever offered me any cocaine. I work in showbusiness and no one has ever offered me any cocaine. Can you believe that? What’s wrong with me? I don’t want any cocaine, by the way (in case you were offering – which, experience suggests, you weren’t) but it would have been nice to be offered once or twice. It’s…

I’m not sorry I didn’t go to drama school. I’ve heard they make you do mime and try to ‘take you apart and put you back together again’ which, even if they mean it metaphorically, isn’t really my cup of tea. They want to ‘take you out of your comfort zone’, and I think that might mean they actually confiscate your cup of…