Björk: "I'm self-sufficient. I spend a lot of time on my own and I shut off quite easily. When I communicate, I communicate 900 per cent, then I shut off, which scares people sometimes."

Björk: "I never really understood the word ‘loneliness’. As far as I was concerned, I was in an orgy with the sky and the ocean, and with nature."

Björk: "Singing is like a celebration of oxygen."

Björk: "You want people to take risks, and OK, they fail, but you don't get the great stuff unless people are willing to risk and not play it safe. And maybe the Icelandic characteristic is better harnessed in these places than on the stock market."

Björk: "I don't really have an ego. I'm not that bothered."

Björk: "Emotions weren’t created to just lie around. You should experience things to the full. I’ve got a sense of the clock ticking. We have to feel all those things to the maximum. Like, I don’t eat a lot but I really love eating. And I like being precise and particular. There is a certain respect in that. If you can do your day depending on how you feel, and enjoy things as well."

Björk: "There are certain emotions in your body that not even your best friend can sympathize with, but you will find the right film or the right book, and it will understand you."

Björk: "I have to re-create the universe every morning when I wake up, and kill it in the evening."

Björk: "I find it so amazing when people tell me that electronic music has no soul. You can't blame the computer. If there's no soul in the music, it's because nobody put it there."

Björk: "Iceland sets a world-record. The United Nations asked people from all over the world a series of questions. Iceland stuck out on one thing. When we were asked what do we believe, 90% said, 'ourselves'. I think I'm in that group. If I get into trouble, there's no God or Allah to sort me out. I have to do it myself."

Björk: "I've always had as many powerful, creative ladies in my life as I have men, and you could probably describe some of those relationships as romantic. I think everyone's bisexual to some degree or another; it's just a question of whether or not you choose to recognise it and embrace it. Personally, I think choosing between men and women is like choosing between cake and ice cream. You'd be daft not to try both when there are so many different flavours."

Björk: "I'm a fountain of blood. In the shape of a girl."

Björk: "There is an emotional attempt in it to be inclusive and with the circular movement unite all, everything, between 2 people."

Björk: "I find it very difficult to draw a line between what's sex and what isn't. It can be very, very sexy to drive a car, and completely unsexy to flirt with someone at a bar."