John Niven Quotes

It is quite widely known that I like shoes. This is not something that defines me as either a woman or a politician, but it has come to define me in the eyes of the newspapers. I wore a pair of leopard-print kitten heels to a Conservative Party Conference a few years ago and the papers have continued to focus on my feet ever since.

I've never got on with the British press because they've always given me such a hard time. Once they build a band up they just want to do people down. They shouldn't concentrate on the colour of someone's shirt they should listen to the music.

Musicians always come off sounding a little bit pretentious, and a little bit... I don't know, hypocritical, from what they do, talking about strong issues.

I don't like everybody knowing what I'm doing, unless it's related to a movie. I don't like speaking to the press. I never did.

When you are a media celebrity, every word you speak is dissected, as are those you choose not to speak.

All musicians start out with ideals but hanging on to them in the face of media scrutiny takes real integrity. Tougher still is to live up to the ideals of your dedicated fans.

I don't tell 'U.S. Weekly' which parties I'm going to. I write songs.

See, I don't know nothing about singing. I never wanted to be a frontman. Frontmen had big egos and was always crazy and aggravating. I just never thought that was a good idea.

I don't understand why the press is so interested in speculating about my appearance, anyway. What does my face have to do with my music or my dancing?

I think J.D. Salinger is correct in granting no interviews, and in making no speeches.

I would not ever try to be a show intellectual, which I was accused of doing a while on ABC. I thought you were supposed to read the guests' books.

I always felt journalists had a very clear idea of what they wanted to write about me before the interview began.

I don't want to have to be like a Scarlett Johansson - who I have nothing against - but I don't want to have to go on talk shows and pull out every SAT word I've ever learned to prove, like, 'Take me seriously, I am intelligent, I can speak.'

I think any branding for me is band-related. It's really weird to get used to the exposure, because I am a naturally introverted person, and I'm not exactly social. Occasionally I can get comfortable enough to talk, but I spend a lot of my days not talking, especially when I'm at home and not on tour.

I spent many years writing and directing in radio drama, so I am comfortable with an audience or a microphone, but I do worry about the blurring of an author's public persona with the work itself. A good 'performer' can make a mediocre book sound strong, and a shy author can leave listeners missing the excellence of his or her writing.

Tabloids are going to focus on my shoes and not my music; that's just what they do.

I liked Camille Paglia. I liked her even better when I heard her talk.

I don't like to talk about other bands in interviews.

I'm not Gore Vidal or William Buckley.

'Snowpiercer' is a little bit more experimental, I think, and crafted for a slightly different audience. 'The Giver' is more about teen angst.

I never read articles about my books.

I get why people want to come see me play guitar, but I still don't understand why people want to interview me.

I don't like getting myself in hot water. But suddenly I find that every minute I have to stop and think about what I'm saying. I can see what's going to happen. I'm going to have to stop giving interviews because I'm always saying the wrong thing. I don't want that to happen.

Being under the political spotlight is far different than anything I'd experienced before. Every word is a critical word. Sometimes you really aren't allowed to get your full thought out. A lot of it is about having a 30-second sound bite.

With the release of her fourth album, 'Red,' in 2012 and a handful of highly publicized romances, Taylor was criticized by the press and other entertainers for such sinful acts as dating people and writing songs about it, gaining a reputation as boy-crazy and love-ridden.