Jane Birkin quotes:

If I were mayor, I'd invite everyone to have free boat trips on the river and free balloon rides over the city. I'd let the elderly in residential homes wander free.

It's usually a jolly good trick to pick up a local tour guide. They can tell you all the anecdotes that make a place interesting. I'm one for rushing off to museums at the crack of dawn, eating fabulous things on terraces for lunch, and enjoying long dinners on balmy evenings.

I put some red stuff on my mouth and cheeks so I look healthy - any old red lip pencil and a lip colour from Dr. Hauschka in a crushed berry tone. I never put anything on my eyes, or I look like Joan Crawford.

Nothing has ever touched on what fun childhood was. Summer holidays were bliss. We made home movies, with real stories in them. My father had such charm and charisma, and made everything so funny.

I feel most comfortable in an old pair of jeans, Converse, and a man's jersey. My best friend cuts my hair with kitchen scissors.

My mother was right: When you've got nothing left, all you can do is get into silk underwear and start reading Proust.

I have never written a book about my life, despite being offered purses of gold. I made 'Boxes' because I wanted to make a sincere depiction of a daughter who has lost her father, or the jealousy one can feel towards a daughter who has become more beautiful than you and whose stepfather starts to take her shopping.

Keep smiling - it takes 10 years off!

I colour my hair mousy brown and I wear makeup only on stage. I use Laura Mercier - something called Biscuit, I think. I run one tiny sponge over my face and cover the red blotches. If I've got some rouge, I'll bung it on my mouth and cheeks.

There's no fun in a bag if it's not kicked around so that it looks as if the cat's been sitting on it - and it usually has. The cat may even be in it! I always put on stickers and beads and worry beads. You can get them from Greece, Israel, Palestine - from anywhere in the world.

I remember being married to John Barry and trying to be the best wife in the world.

Robert Louis Stevenson... I'm focusing on the late short stories that I was ignorant of. I always thought he was a boys' author, but he's not at all.

I had a baby at 19 and was a grandmother by 39. Now, my children lend me their children to take them off to Brittany. It's divine. I'm quite exceptionally lucky. I've never had a week without having all three of my daughters on the telephone.

When I arrived in France aged 20, I marched against the death penalty, which was an unpopular thing to protest against at the time.

One of the things I've discovered, thanks to the Japanese, is that you should enjoy yourself. In the old days, I used to think: 'Oh, never be satisfied, never admit to being happy.' But there's no curse in being happy.

Any film I see at two o'clock in afternoon with my mother seems to cast a strange spell that means we both come out sobbing.

I don't much enjoy travelling, but I have always longed to take a slow train to Russia. I'd like to go alone - like writers do - with only a pencil and piece of paper as company. I'd take my sketchbook and note down all the wonderful details of other travellers.

David Attenborough... has that wonderful, breathy voice, and he's always so fascinated by what he's seeing. There's nothing about him that I can't find attractive.

I grind my teeth and keep my thumbs in so tight that I've dislocated them, just not to scream. Sometimes as an actor one is lucky enough to be asked to scream.

I don't know why people keep banging on about the '60s. I came from a conventional family and I didn't go off with different people - I rather wish I had now, seeing all the fun everyone else was having.

I always hang things on my bags because I don't like them looking like everyone else's.

People always like things that seem exotic.

When I was at school I used to scream in trains, in those concertina things between the carriages. I used to try to be so good that sometimes I couldn't bear it any more.

I never have more than one bag at a time. I think one is already quite enough. Also, I hate changing bags, so I never have the thing of having ten bags. Any bag that's with me will take the same course as I will. It will take the same airplanes and will be squashed in the same way and will be used as a cushion in the airports.

At school, I used to hear, 'You're a half-caste.' They'd laugh at my figure and say, 'Are you a boy or a girl?'

I don't know why people keep banging on about the '60s. I was very conventional because I came from a conventional family and I didn't go off with different people - I rather wish I had now, seeing all the fun everyone else was having

A Birkin bag is a very good rain hat; just put everything else in a plastic bag.

When my father died, my mother came back from being Mrs. Birkin to being Judy Campbell. She was a stunning actress. She came out of her shell. She was herself again: this very independent, funny, intellectual lady - and was able to perform again, which was her life before meeting my father squashed it out.

When I made mistakes, people used to laugh. I could have learnt better, but I've always liked to make people laugh.

My father was a painter, so I was encouraged to take a sketchbook everywhere. Cameras are perishable, but I still have tonnes of sketchbooks from all the trips I've ever been on. It gets you by when you don't know what to give people as a gift; drawings are good souvenirs.

Jacques Doillon wanted me to be in his film, 'La Fille Prodigue,' and there I was, expecting, for some reason, this great bearded man, when a splendid looking red-Indian style man appeared at my door. I said no to his film because I knew that if I said yes, I would run off with him.

Big Ben... hearing the chimes makes me feel at home.

I have to be careful not to get a paunch - I'm so skinny that if I put any weight anywhere, it'd be there, and I don't like a bulge. I wouldn't mind if it went on my bosom, but it doesn't.

I love Dickens because it makes me chuckle to myself so. He has taken me to another world and out of so many earthly miseries.

I think I did a lot of humorous films when I was young, and they were No. 1 films.

When you start recognising that you're having fun, life can be delightful.

My distinguishing feature is the gap between my teeth. I had to wear a brace because my teeth used to stick out like guns from a fortress.

I don't like getting older, but there's nothing I can do. Hitting 60 wasn't great, but I think I was lucky in not being that beautiful; it can be really cruel on people who have been stunning.

I think it's always good to read local authors or relevant books. In Egypt, I studied hieroglyphics and read everything about the mummies.

My first husband, John Barry, was a composer. I couldn't believe that this sophisticated, talented genius chose me and not any of the other girls. I was so flattered, so excited, so in love with him. Of course, my parents were horrified, as he'd been married once and had a daughter with the au pair girl.

If you fall in love with a country and its people, that makes any country warm to you.

But who wants an easy life ? It's boring !

I'd rather live on my own than live with a face that looks at me with the wrong eyes.

My look is a cocktail. I'm not as nicely turned out as the french, but I don't care like the English.

Everything I wear doesnt put me in the league of women. If I were a boy, I could look a lot prettier than a lot of boys I know.

There's no fun in a bag if it's not kicked around, so that it looks as if the cat's been sitting on it-and it usually has. The cat may even be in it! I always put on stickers and beads and worry beads. You can get them from Greece, Israel, Palestine-from anywhere in the world. I always hang things on my bags because I don't like them looking like everyone else's.

I know what it's like to have someone coming home who looks at you not in the way they used to in the old days, and I've seen my own face contorted with sadness and rage in the mirror.

I didn't really think of myself as being a muse.

I loved having a crew. I loved being the person who woke at six in the morning and knew where to put the camera. I loved watching the actresses cry, and to know that if you were clever and didn't do too many rehearsals, that it just came that way.

I understand the joy of having a female actress like Charlotte [Gainsbourg] and watching her give everything, and be able to capture it.

I only like boutiques.