Sue Townsend dead: Adrian Mole's best quotes

The socially awkward teenager was Townsend's best-loved creation

Gian Sammarco plays Adrian Mole in 'The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole' (Rex Features)

Sue Townsend will best be remembered for her much-loved Adrian Mole diaries.

Her socially awkward and self-proclaimed 'intellectual' teenage creation has spawned one of the most successful book series of our time.

Townsend instilled wit and wisdom into her 13 ¾ year old protagonist, whose commentary ranged from class consciousness, the British political system, and -not forgetting - his undying love for neighbour Pandora Braithwaite.

His wit and wisdom have planted him fondly in the British imagination where he will doubtless live for decades more.

Townsend said her favourite Adrian Mole quote was the last line of the first diary, written after Mole had tried glue sniffing and accidentally stuck a model aeroplane to his nose: “I rang Pandora, she is coming round after her viola lesson. Love is the only thing that keeps me sane…”

Here we round-up some of the best lines from Your Humble and Obedient Servant, A Mole.

Adrian Mole's best quotes

1. “My skin is dead good. I think it must be a combination of being in love and Lucozade.”

2. “I have realised I have never seen a dead body or a real female nipple. This is what comes of living in a cul-de-sac.”

3. “I have a problem. I am an intellectual, but at the same time I am not very clever."

4. “I asked Pandora how long she would love me. She said, ‘As long as Britain has Gibraltar.’”

5. “Guilt is a destructive emotion and doesn’t fit in with my Life Plan.”

6. “I was racked with sexuality but it wore off when I helped my father put manure on our rose bed.”

7. “Mrs Thatcher has got eyes like a psychotic killer, but a voice like a gentle person. It is a bit confusing.”

8. “My mother is in the hospital grounds smoking a cigarette. She is looking old and haggard. All the debauchery is catching up with her.”

9. “Perhaps when I am famous and my diary is discovered people will understand the torment of being a 13 3/4 year old undiscovered intellectual.”

10. “The tap drips and keeps me awake/ In the morning there will be a lake” – one of the first poems written by Adrian Albert Mole, aged 13 ¾.

11. “Pandora smiled at me in school dinner today, but I was choking on a piece of gristle so I couldn't smile back. Just my luck!”

12. “Evelyn Waugh must be dead proud of his daughter, Auberon.”

13. “There's only one thing more boring than listening to other people's dreams, and that's listening to their problems.”

14. “My father was reading Playboy under cover of the candlelight and I was reading Hard Times by my key-ring torch.”

15. “After hearing the disgusting noises from downstairs last night, I have also vowed never to drink alcohol.”

Read more: Sue Townsend interview
Sue Townsend dies aged 68