63 Quotes by Jonathan Dimbleby

I have a great deal of joy in my life, and I'm very fortunate. That combination makes you aware of just how wonderful life can be on the one hand and how dreadful it can be for people on the other. You can't be happy in isolation.

I cycle, I take an hour's strenuous walk in the evening, I play tennis twice a week with a trainer, and I sail. I used to ride horses professionally - I'd ride seven or eight horses a day, so I had to be fit for that.

For a few months when I was about 17, I smoked a small cigar because I thought it looked cool and it would get me the girls. It didn't.

I was obliged to play the piano, like middle-class children are. I didn't start to love it until I was 14.

My only real claim to fame is that I was southern England show-jumping champion in 1966. The day after my father died, 'Horse & Hound' magazine tipped me as a future Olympic champion, and I took it seriously. You can only really enjoy something if you take it seriously.

Ethiopia is engraved on my heart. I first went in 1973 because I heard of a terrible famine. They were denying it even as we got the film out. The coverage destroyed the emperor's credibility.

I've never been a depressive, but I felt quite close to the edge at times. But you never know what's around the corner. Mercifully, what's around the corner is joy.

Rolling my trousers down to expose the upper part of my buttocks and having a knife pressed up and down my spine by a Russian white witch, as she murmured incantations, was certainly a new experience to cure my backache. It was surprisingly soothing.

I don't love the media. I'm part of it, but you can't love a porcupine.