James May Quotes

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James May

Profession : Journalist

Birth : January 16, 1963

I always said it was a privilege to end up on the television. It wasn't my ambition; I fell into editing magazines and writing about cars, and then I ended up on the telly.

James May

It's fairly well known that we all hate each other to some extent. 'Top Gear' has worked because of a combination of camaraderie and mutual dislike. That's actually the magic.

James May

Not being part of the BBC with 'Top Gear' any more does pain me, because it's an organisation I approve of.

James May

The shirt thing just started one day when I bought one with a really interesting pattern, and people laughed at it, so I thought, 'I'll keep buying daft shirts with flowers on.'

James May

I know there have been some catastrophically unpopular programmes on television over the years. Has it ever got to the point where the only person still interested in what's happening is the person who's on the telly?

James May

I very briefly had a microwave oven that I quickly gave away, because I could never work out what they do better than a regular oven.

James May

I'm a great believer in the principle of try it and work it out. If a gadget is designed well, you can easily work out how to use it. But if you can't, it isn't shameful to read the instructions.

James May

I'm a big user of digital technology, but I don't find it beautiful.

James May

If it were possible - and I hope it will be some day - I'd like some sort of anti-gravity travel capsule: some way to travel around the without the need for jets and wings and so on.

James May

I think there are bigger problems in the world than Jeremy Clarkson.

James May

I don't want Jeremy Clarkson anywhere near my shed or my toolbox or my piano. He's interested in fashionable restaurants and celebrity gossip - I'm not interested in those.

James May

I am actually a perfectly capable modern man who can cook, clean, wash, and find my way to places, but nobody believes it.

James May

You have to be a bit mad and conceited to go on television.

James May

I suppose I could do 'The Reassembler' at 80. But it would be a terrible cliche.

James May

I don't look like Susan Boyle!

James May

Our 'Top Gear' characters are based on our own characters, if exaggerated and cartoonified. We try not to be completely different to who we are, because you couldn't carry it off in the long run.

James May

I don't like to think I am a celebrity; I am just a bloke on the telly.

James May

It would be a bloody tough call to do 'Top Gear' without Jeremy. That would be a bit of a daft idea.

James May

I hate the idea of people nicking my stuff, but in all honesty, I'm pretty well off. If a genuinely desperate man on his last gasp nicks my coat from the pub on a freezing night, well, he's welcome to it. It'll change his life. Mine's only inconvenienced by having to buy another one.

James May

The decline of practical skills, some of them very day-to-day, among a generation of British men is very worrying. They can't put up a shelf, wire a plug, countersink a screw, iron a shirt. They believe it's endearing and cute to be useless, whereas I think it's boring, and everyone's getting sick of it.

James May