Cumberbatch: "If you have an over-preoccupation with perception and trying to please people's expectations, then you can go mad."

Cumberbatch: "One of the fears of having too much work is not having time to observe. And once you get recognised, there is nowhere for you to look any more. You can't sit on a night bus and watch it all happen."

Cumberbatch: "Mystique is rare now, isn't it? There aren't that many enigmas in this modern world."

Cumberbatch: "We're living through a time where we are fighting wars fostered by politics, admittedly not on the same scale as the First World War, but with equally tragic realities for our soldiers and their families."

Cumberbatch: "We all want to escape our circumstances, don't we? Especially if you are an actor."

Cumberbatch: "I think with any characterization there's a point where you empathize, no matter how much of a deviance his or her actions may be from your understanding of humanity."

Cumberbatch: "There's no shame in stealing - any actor who says he doesn't is lying. You steal from everything."

Cumberbatch: "I had a real yearning to make use of the opportunities I had at school. When I heard about the gap year of teaching English at a Tibetan monastery, I knew I had to do something about it really quickly, otherwise it was going to get allocated."

Cumberbatch: "Fame is a weird one. You need to distance yourself from it. People see a value in you that you don't see yourself."

Cumberbatch: "I have an appetite for the normal in my life, as well as the abnormal."

Cumberbatch: "Live a life less ordinary."

Cumberbatch: "Every job is incredibly different, and I love it because you're picking up skill sets and experiences. It's the university of life."

Cumberbatch: "A woman who knows that she doesn't have to get all decked out to look good is sexy. A woman who can make you feel smart with her conversation skills is also sexy. I believe the sense of humor is important."

Cumberbatch: "I realised quite early on that, although I wasn't trying to make a career speciality of it, I was playing slightly asexual, sociopathic intellectuals."

Cumberbatch: "The more charming person is the person who admits the other person is more charming."

Cumberbatch: "I had the privilege of being able to choose, or at least have the opportunity to work at, being anything but an actor."

Cumberbatch: "When you're a kid, 'Star Trek' is a slower burn. It's funny, it's entertaining, but it also has a maturity about it - which is its universal appeal, I think."

Cumberbatch: "Do awards change careers? Well, I haven't heard of many stories where that's the case. It's a fun excuse to meet colleagues and celebrate people who've done well that year in certain people's eyes, and it's nothing more than that."

Cumberbatch: "Upper class to me means you are either born into wealth or you're Royalty."

Cumberbatch: "The further you get away from yourself, the more challenging it is. Not to be in your comfort zone is great fun."

Cumberbatch: "'Frankenstein' was all about the idea that, through electricity and the destruction of night, man creating light and darkness, we took on god-like powers and then abused them like gods, and we are only men. That's a story about man making a man in his own image. The inversion of natural order."

Cumberbatch: "Enjoy the journey of life and not just the endgame."

Cumberbatch: "People's hands fascinate me. It's tempting to look at a businessman's left hand and see if there's an indentation from a missing wedding ring. Or maybe there's a tan line and the skin is pressed down where's he's worked a ring off his finger."

Cumberbatch: "New York City is crazy and beautiful and really close to my heart, and I've always had dear friends here - family, actually, I would say."

Cumberbatch: "Pull the hair on my head the wrong way, and I would be on my knees begging for mercy. I have very sensitive follicles."

Cumberbatch: "As an actor, you are aware of how a role can seep into your real life."

Cumberbatch: "If people ask, 'Are you Sherlock Holmes?', it's horribly naff, but I say, 'I'm not, I just look a bit like him' - which is how I feel. There are bad attributes of his that I really don't share!"

Cumberbatch: "Talking about class terrifies me. There is no way of winning."