For the first time ever, I was alone in a different country. I was nervous about how I was going to cope in this big bustling city, and so I employed a technique which still serves me well today. I imagined myself as someone who relished new exciting opportunities, who was utterly unafraid and perpetually optimistic. It was a kind of reinvention. Everyone I met was new. These people didn't know me, there was no shared history, so I could be anything or anyone I wanted to be. My theory was that if I behaved like a confident, cheerful person, eventually I would buy it myself, and become that. I always had traces of strength somewhere inside me, it wasn't fake. It was just a way of summoning my courage to the fore and not letting any creeping self-doubt hinder my adventures. This method worked then, and it works now.

— Dawn French

Funny how women are ashamed of their inner fairy whereas men are forever proudly displaying their inner cowboy or fireman

— Dawn French

I don't know what the future holds, but I have to be confident about it. It's just the way I am.

— Dawn French

I have turned away from the thought of writing fiction in the past through what I suppose is, actually, fear. The direct, raw invitation for the reader to come in and explore my imagination is fairly scary for me, so I have busied myself with so much else.

— Dawn French

I keep my own personality in a cupboard under the stairs at home so that no one else can see it or nick it.

— Dawn French

I never do any television without chocolate. That's my motto and I live by it. Quite often I write the scripts and I make sure there are chocolate scenes. Actually I'm a bit of a chocolate tart and will eat anything. It's amazing I'm so slim.

— Dawn French

It was my father who taught me to value myself. He told me that I was uncommonly beautiful and that I was the most precious thing in his life.

— Dawn French

My approach to parenting is that everything is open - everything. I'm not very good at covert, or subtle, and I've had to learn timing. I do blunder in a bit.

— Dawn French

My best friend is the most important girl, outside of family, to me. I met her when I went to college and we bonded immediately. I'd do anything for her at any time. We phone each other every day.

— Dawn French

My daughter couldn't care less about me being famous. She finds it revolting and, like a lot of teenagers, is virtually allergic to me. That started at 12 and hasn't gone anywhere yet.

— Dawn French