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Quotes by Ben Elton

Even if it sounds pretentious, which it isn't-I've found it artistically challenging to produce a monologue that is filled with laughter and ideas. It's a tough thing to pull off, but satire is better if it has conviction behind it.
– Ben Elton
I don't know about the superhighways-it's a load of technowank, frankly.
– Ben Elton
I owe my future married happiness to trade union legislation. In 1986, when Rik Mayall and I toured Australia, we had to have a support act of two Aussies for every one Brit, so they booked an all-girl band called The Jam Tarts, which she was in.
– Ben Elton
I try hard not to preach, but I get carried away, which is a mistake, but it's a risk worth running.
– Ben Elton
I'm easy to work with, not a pushover, but I respond to criticism and find it inspiring.
– Ben Elton
I'm not writing the novels to be a preacher, but I obviously feel, as everybody doe,s strongly about environmental issues. But I'm not a zealot. I don't think we should all have to wear Hessian underwear and knit our yoghurt.
– Ben Elton
Most of my stand-up comedy is about being a small, scared, neurotic individual among the billions of other small, scared, neurotic individuals that make up the mass which is us. I always think the first target of a stand-up comic should be themselves-we all share our weaknesses, and it's fun to use them as a source of comedy.
– Ben Elton
Most of my work isn't directly autobiographical. It tends to be an amalgam of things I've seen and heard and thought and conversations I've had.
– Ben Elton
My advice to anyone adapting a novel is that once they've read it and learnt to understand it, then they must throw it away and never look at it again!
– Ben Elton
Prevarication is the absolute essence of any endeavour, but it's not just writing novels, it could be the situation of paying a gas bill. People will basically do anything to avoid doing the thing that they're supposed to be doing.
– Ben Elton
We've all got to look at ourselves, start with yourself, that's all you can do. I believe that we can act responsibly as a group, it's just that there are vested interests telling us not to bother.
– Ben Elton
Yes, OK, farty is a silly word. I wish I'd never used it. I'm 34. Perhaps it was a word for my 20s.
– Ben Elton
Sympathy for victims is always counter-balanced by an equal and opposite feeling of resentment towards them.
– Ben Elton
If only the strength of the love that people feel when it is reciprocated could be as intense and obsessive as the love we feel when it is not then marriages would be truly made in heaven.
– Ben Elton
I think trying to be cool is the worst possible ambition - and I have never suffered from it.
– Ben Elton
I find the fact that billionaires are quoted as if the fact that they are billionaires gives them some kind of wisdom is outrageous.
– Ben Elton