John Lydon

I've never told anyone this. But I suffer from terrible stage fright. True. You can't tell though, can you? Unbelievable, the panic. I nearly die of fear before I go on stage. Something wicked. I can't eat a thing the day before a gig. It'd make me vomit.

When you grew up like me and my four brothers, you end up feeling somewhat inadequate, like somehow you don't count. I was very ill as a child and in and out of hospital. That sort of alienates you, and in my songs I put that to good use.

I love being alive so much. When you come out of comas in your childhood, every moment awake is a joyous occasion.

Dummy Dum Dum was my nickname for years at school. I was the strange one of the family, the one who couldn't remember his name.

All the things that you would have thought would have made me a professional A1 criminal... wrong. I decided that was too lazy and easy, and because of the way British society is, quite frankly you were denied an education, so I got one of my own.

I had an Irish Catholic education. Horrible nuns, vindictive and cruel.

One of the most beautiful things about Britain, apart from the NHS and the free education, is the British Army.

Me, as a human, I never want to take away another human being's choices or lifestyles or anything.

My inspiration is everything that the human being gets up to.

I have one major problem with the Internet: It's full of liars.

I have one major problem with the internet: It's full of liars. There doesn't seem to be any way to answer to people lying about you.

You have moments of grief in life, and if you can put pen to paper and capture that, that's something wonderful. I can revisit actual songs about past deaths, and I know that emotion is as true now as it was then.