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 ""Lax - that's your failing. Lax from the neck up and relax from the neck down!""

- Hilda to Stan Ogden ""Alec is always the fourth fella when there are only three shovels.""

- Rita Fairclough ""He's like a vampire, draining the life out of people, destroying them.""

- Ken Barlow about Mike Baldwin ""Do you know, I could have quite happily stopped in my pit til dinnertime... I hate these dark mornings. Ya see, I'm a sunshine person me. I should have been a Californian beach boy I reckon. I can just see meself now... surfin' the high rollers with the water streamin' off me bronzed, rippling pectorals.""

- Jack Duckworth ""You are the only bloke I know who irons a crease in his pullovers.""

- Deirdre Barlow to Ken ""You really are going to have to learn when people are pulling yer skinny little legs.""

- Rita Fairclough to Mavis Wilton ""Well he's er... short, fat and balding - although he tries to hide it by dragging a few strands across. And he's got a face like one of them cabbage patch dolls. And he wears rather a lot of that sweet-smelling aftershave - too much really, someone ought to tell him about it. Oh yeah, and he's got erm... a funny manner about him. He talks like a Sergeant Major who's swallowed a dictionary.""

- Curly Watts describing Reg Holdsworth ""You're a machine for driving people round the bend.""

- Don Brennan to Ivy ""She's got a bit power mad since we let her decide what to have on t'sandwiches.""

- Vera Duckworth about Ida Clough ""Tommy Cooper couldn't tell a story as daft as that! Did you listen to what you were saying?! Already it's only the first of January and you're the champion liar of 1980!""

- Rita Fairclough, shouting at Len ""Listen to her - Tracy Barlow, the living proof there's no justice in the world." Hayley Cropper "Nope, that's why I should be running it. It would be a much better place." Tracy Barlow "Your mother's ashamed of you, your daughter barely knows you, your donor kidney would reject you if it could, but here you are still buzzing around like the queen bee, passing judgements on everyone you meet." Hayley Cropper" ""Did yer... want to say something, Bet?" Steve McDonald "Yes I did, love. I think I wanted to say... Personally, I wouldn't trust you as far as I could throw you. Only a little bird tells me that you've got another little bird on the side. Now you don't have to say whether I'm well-informed but I'll warn yer, if you damage that little bird's wings, I shall pluck yer, stuff yer and roast yer. Give your mum my love." Bet Gilroy" ""Will you tell me something, Mrs Sharples? The old days - the bad old days - why do you keep harping back to them, 'cos they're gone now?" Elsie Tanner "Well, bad old days they might have been...(thinks) There's no "might" about it - they were. Do you know, when the people next door cleaned their house out, they used to swill it out wi' a hosepipe, but they were the days when I were young...though life was 'ard, it was very sweet. And that's why we old people live in the past." Ena Sharples ''"" ""What was that dreadful noise?" Annie Walker "Oh, there wasn't none, Mrs Walker. It was only me singing." Hilda Ogden" ""Put some folk behind a boozer bar, they think they're the Queen Mother, don't they? Oh, present company exonerated of course. No, what I'm implying is, if you'll take my advice Mrs. Walker, you'll keep that one well away from Mr. Walker." Hilda Ogden about Betty Turpin "Mrs. Ogden, to the best of my belief, I have never taken your advice in anything, and I'm certainly not going to start now." Annie Walker" ""Are you going to kiss me under this mistletoe?" Phyllis Pearce "I wouldn't kiss you under an anaesthetic." Percy Sugden" ""I like to think of myself as being proactive." Tracy Barlow "You're right...I've read the graffiti on the gents' bog wall." Tina McIntyre" ""What's that lipstick taste of?" Stan Ogden "Woman, Stanley, woman!" Hilda Ogden" ""May I say what a charming outfit that is." Annie Walker "Oh you like it, do you?" Elsie Tanner "My dear, I've always liked it." Annie Walker" ""The usual, Mrs Sharples?" Annie Walker "Without lipstick, if you don’t mind. The last glass I had in ‘ere reminded me of summat that Mae West had emptied." Ena Sharples" ""'If you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all." Deirdre Barlow "I think I'll go home then." Blanche Hunt" ""So what's your poison?" Wilf Morton "Strychnine - make yours a double." Blanche Hunt" ""The only thing lower than that girl's neck line is her IQ.""

- Tony Gordon about Rosie Webster ""It's news to me that badger's bums are rough. I'd always thought they would be quite smooth.""

- Kirk Sutherland after reading online comments about Beth Tinker ""I predict you will get many men... if you keep dressing like a tart.""

- Blanche Hunt tells Kelly Crabtree's fortune ""I reckon your story had more holes in it than Joe's boat.""

- Tracy Barlow to Gail McIntyre ""She really believes there's her and the rest of us. She isn't being condescending or owt. She really believes it.""

- Bet Lynch about Annie Walker ""I can just see that one on the front row - knit one, pearl one every time a head drops.""

- Sheila Crossley about Hilda Ogden ""By heck! They can live surrounded by evil and muck for years without turning a hair. But let a bit fall on their own doorstep and they sprout more principles and moral indignation than a young parson.""

- Ena Sharples ""Two tonne Turpin? I could give 'er twenty yard start with me legs tied together.""

- Hilda Ogden ""I find things rather a strain with Mrs Ogden. I begin to doubt my reason after a while.""

- Emily Nugent ""I've done the solitude bit. I know what it's like. For twenty four hours it's great. Then you start wishin' somebody'd break the door down. An' if they don't you can always run out of fags. There's always a corner shop an' a pub an' some daft devil livin' next door!""

- Elsie Tanner ""When they invented the word ‘impossible’ they must have had you in mind.""

- Alice Pickens to Albert Tatlock ""If you set foot in here again, I will skull-drag you around this room, baby or no baby.""

- Karen McDonald to Tracy Barlow ""Stick with me and you’ll be buried in a silver casket.""

- Dave Smith to Ray Langton ""If you take a mirror and stick it up your nose - like dividing your face - well, if you look into another mirror, you can sort of make one big face out of half of your face, and it's different right and left. One of them's more what your face would be if you were a man, and the other's more what it would be if you were a woman, if you weren't one already. So when you fall for somebody, what you're seeing - now hang on a minute 'cos this bit's complicated - you see the face made up of the halves they'd be if that person were the same sex as you are. So your brain is imagining, although you don't know this, and if your brain is seeing that person as being the sort of person that you think you are yourself, then you fancy that person, and it's as simple as that.""

- Raquel Wolstenhulme describing something on a television documentary she watched ""Look at that collection there... and to think Walt Disney died without drawing any of 'em""

- Alec Gilroy about Jack Duckworth, Don Brennan and Fred Elliott ""D'ya know, I remember when me and our Jack first got wed. He couldn't wait to spend time wi' me... you know? Now it's 'Ooh I've got headache', 'Ooh I'm watchin' snooker', 'got a pint in?'. Makes yer flamin' sick!""

- Vera Duckworth """What have I told you about nicking sweets?" Cilla Brown "Don't get caught..." Chesney Brown "Exactly!" Cilla Brown" ""You think you're queen of the Rovers? You're a tart with a bus pass...""

- Becky McDonald to Liz McDonald ""Out! You're poison, Tanya, always were and always will be. I was a fool to have ever given you a second chance. I want you out of here now, and I never want to see your evil little face in my pub ever again!""

- Bet Gilroy to Tanya Pooley ""Well, I mean you have a kind of duty, don’t you, to them that, well, treasure the experience of meeting you. I mean, to them it could be the high spot of their lives so I’d never let them see that I’m bored out of my mind""

- Audrey Roberts on being the Mayoress "''"A fascinating freemasonary, a volume of unwritten rules. These are the driving forces behind life in the working class street in the north of England. The purpose of Florizel Street is to examine a community of this nature, and to entertain"."

- Tony Warren in a 1960 memo to senior management at Granada Television ""Couldn't you just hang on a bit love, give me a chance to get me face on?""

- Bet Lynch """I'll give you this - yer did get yourself away from this place an' not just talk about it like most of 'em do"""

- Ena Sharples to David Barlow ""Merry Christmas, Mrs. Sharples." Elsie Tanner "Merry Christmas, Elsie Tanner. You're lookin' very cheerful in the circumstances." Ena Sharples "Well yes, after all, it is my season in a manner of speakin', isn't it? You know, good will to all men." Elsie Tanner"

""We all tend to forget at times that Mrs Sharples is really a very unimportant old woman".""

- Annie Walker

""D'you ever believe I get tired of bein' blamed for everythin' that goes on in this Street, from blocked sinks to wives leavin' home?""

- Ena Sharples

""All I ever get for Christmas is a frozen lavvy.""

- Ena Sharples

""I'm your favourite spinster. A bit too precise...too tidy. Getting a little too particular, a bit querulous. Anxious to be friendly, but terribly afraid of being...rebuffed. Always available. Always there. But always in the background.""

- Emily Nugent

""As far as I'm concerned the whole thing's a complete alfresco.""

- Hilda Ogden

""The truth is, she was not perfect. She was flawed. She was real. She was my light, my beautiful coruscating light. My life was a dark corner and she came into it. I could see. I could see the world with her. I understood life. I understood love. She was my constant, my comfort, my compass.""

- Roy Cropper at Hayley's funeral ""An alcoholic and an arsonist open a bar? Sounds like the start of a joke""

- Blanche Hunt on Peter and Leanne Barlow's business plans ""There's nowt like young love...and that's nowt like it.""

- Blanche Hunt about Ken Barlow and Deirdre Rachid ""I am so stupid" Deirdre Barlow "It's taken you fifty-odd years to realise that? Oh, hallelujah." Blanche Hunt" ""It smells like an anchovy's jockstrap in here.""

- Blanche Hunt ""He looks like he should be crayoning somethin' and you, you can call yerself what you like, but I'm not lettin' any feller who wears women's underwear anywhere near my flesh and blood.""

- Blanche Hunt to Roy and Hayley Cropper ""Is someone going to cook me tea, or am I going to have to report you to Help the Aged?""

- Blanche Hunt ""Ken recently had an affair with an actress. Oh, it wasn't Nicole Kidman or Glenda Jackson... she lived on a tugboat""

- Blanche Hunt ""Ethel Armitage were buried in a bio-degradable coffin made of banana leaves. She didn't even like bananas. They gave her terrible wind.""

- Blanche Hunt ""People in wigs twist things - ask Danny La Rue""

- Blanche Hunt watching a trial in court ""I'm bringing a Jean Plaidy, 'cos the first few days can be quite dull at a trial""

- Blanche Hunt ""I'll tell you, Kenneth - you'd better learn to enjoy other people's misfortunes or you'll have a very unhappy old age.""

- Blanche Hunt ""An ex-prostitute and an alcoholic - Jerry Springer'd do cartwheels""

- Blanche Hunt about Peter Barlow and Leanne Battersby ""Shouldn't you be knitting under a guillotine somewhere?""

- Ken Barlow to Blanche Hunt ""I think Peter's turned a corner" Ken Barlow "Let's hope there isn't a pub on it" Blanche Hunt" ""You know what I look for in a man?" Gail McIntyre "Just jumped the fence at Rampton?" Nick Tilsley" ""You buried my son under a knicker factory?""

- Joy Fishwick to John Stape ""The programme is doomed from the outset... with its dreary signature tune and grim scenes of a row of terraced houses and smoking chimneys. For there is little reality in this new serial, which apparently, we have to suffer twice a week.""

- Ken Irwin's review of the first episode in the Daily Mirror, 1960 ""Nothing has ever been greeted with a more unanimous outburst of critical rage than the "Coronation Street" series, but one gathers that is has achieved a degree of popularity which relegates all its elder brethren to the second division of mass appeal.""

- The Times, 1st August 1961

"""I'm only trying to improve business." Bet Lynch "I think you can safely leave that to me and the beer, don't you think, dear, rather than your cleavage?" Annie Walker"

""They've bin talkin' about me ever since I put me first pair o'nylons on.""

- Elsie Tanner

""Some marriages, Mrs Howard, are made in Heaven and some in haste""

- Annie Walker to Elsie Howard

""If a workin' man went abroad when I was in me prime, he either went to get shot at, convert the 'eathen or emigrate.""

- Ena Sharples

""Well, age is competition but yours is a bit of an handicap, isn't it?""

- Hilda Ogden to Elsie Tanner

""This is us, Maggie - dirty canals, tall chimneys, terraced houses and corner shops.""

- Alf Roberts to Maggie Clegg

""You can sign a petition for your husband. It's what they call doing it by poxy""

- Hilda Ogden

""Just because you speak with a lace curtain accent an' 'ave got a degree, doesn't mean that you know it all, Ken Barlow!""

- Ena Sharples

""Oh, I admit I might have got carried away on the tide of public opinion, so to speak. It's what they call mob diphtheria""

- Hilda Ogden

""Elsie Tanner thinks that everything in trousers is after her - from Boy Scouts upwards!""

- Annie Walker

""What pride have I got left? I've tottered on five inch heals up and down this street for the last twenty years. And for what? To catch miself a fellah. And everybody's known it.""

- Elsie Tanner

""Annie Walker being subjected to a stomach pump operation for no good reason is like the Queen falling off her horse at the Trooping of the Colour.""

- Ken Barlow

""Ena Sharples has got enough tongue for two sets of teeth""

- Elsie Tanner

""I've seen gongs in boarding houses less brass-faced than her""

- Vera Duckworth about Bet Lynch

""Mavis is the only person in the world who looks six times both ways before crossing a one way street""

- Rita Fairclough

""Counting was my favourite subject at school.""

- Kirk Sutherland "After what - colouring?" Sally Webster

""Beth reckons I'm a good listener." Kirk Sutherland "Well, with her gob, I'd have thought it was a prerequisite" Carla Connor"

""We don't need sewers round 'ere, we've got Ena Sharples!""

- Elsie Tanner

""When you're as old as I am, and your whole world's beginning to crumble, until there's absolutely nothing left, then you fight for what you still 'ave, even if it's only a chair and a lot of old memories.""

- Ena Sharples

""She's about as scary as an Arctic roll""

- David Platt about Maria Connor

""Everyone knows you're as thick as gravy""

- Todd Grimshaw to Maria Connor

""You're about as good at this bar maid lark as your dad was at swimming""

- Tracy Barlow to Tina McIntyre ""Oh look, here comes the rest of the village people""

- Gail Hillman about Jason Grimshaw ""I thought it was a flamin piano coming down t'stairs""

- Audrey Roberts after Alf has a fall at home ""Skirt no bigger than a belt, too much eyeliner, and roots as dark as her soul.""

- Blanche Hunt about Liz McDonald ""...probably the single most significant achievement in British television history""

- Radio Times ""You see the thing is Andrew, men like to talk about their families. They love it. And what was I meant to say eh? 'Well I'm sorry to have to tell you boys, but Elizabeth's left me so she has, and me son's in the big house. People don't want to hear about that so they don't, they wanna hear about certificates on the wall, wee caps and gowns, that's what they want. You're just like him now, aren't ye? You're a layabout. A good for nothin'. Never be a man, will ye? Even if ye have fifty women and a hundred kids you'll never make it to being a man""

- Jim McDonald ""A very sophisticated sort of woman, Mavis, totally different from you""

- Derek to Mavis Wilton about Angela Hawthorne ""You know what I think, that if you admit to living in the past, you're saying that you've got no future, and not much in the present""

- Elsie Howard ""She's so stooped, she's folded in half""

- Becky McDonald about Deirdre Barlow ""You're Norman Bates with a briefcase""

- Gail to Richard Hillman ""You should've stayed at the party, Maxine...""

- Richard Hillman about to commit another murder... ""I don't think our Jack would like you to do that, coz 'e's a bit possessive about parts of my body. But I don't know why, coz e' hasn't touched 'em for ages""

- Vera Duckworth ""I've put up with your heart-truths for long enough, not to mention your your mood changes, selfishness and your sheer bloody-mindedness. It's all part of a game plan, isn't it? Cut me out, don't let me get close, don't let me get a toe-hold in your life, now what happened, Denise, eh? You got tired of me? Bored? Didn't like the way I ate my corn flakes, what? You never did have the decency to tell me. Flirtation was it, a little bit of fun? And here's me dumb enough to think we're having an adult relationship. I must have been insane to want you, and your bundle of neuroses, well I don't give a damn about being part of your life anymore, but I intend to be part of Daniel's. And I don't mean, I don't mean just the little bits that you graciously consent to dole out to me if by some miracle you happen to be in a good mood. Now I've had enough with you calling the shots, well now it's my turn. I'm going to do what I should've done months ago. I'm going to see a solicitor and get full rights to MY SON!""

- Ken Barlow to Denise Osbourne ""Just because you’ve got a lot of weight it doesn’t mean you can chuck it about, you know""

- Hilda Ogden to Betty Turpin ""Amy's father's living with Carla's ex-sister-in-law... We're practically family!""

- Blanche Hunt ""When it happened, for a couple of weeks I suppose, I was just stunned, I think you are, then of course reality returns and you take stock of yourself, realise what you've got, what there is left, I'm afraid it's a very barren moment actually""

- Emily Bishop to Deirdre Langton about Ernest's murder ""Not much of a catch is it, an undertaker? Mind you I suppose in a certain light she could look a bit like a corpse""

- Audrey Roberts gossiping about Blanche Hunt and Archie Shuttleworth ""I were always led to believe I were equally good at most things. I were told that when I were at school. They said - 'Raquel - you have no particular talents'.""

- Raquel Wolstenhulme ""I think they spend too much time apologising for it and not enough time trying to make it better.""

- Ena Sharples about the community ""You honestly think that's the only reason why I left you? Putting a new sink in makes everything alright? New wallpaper on t'back bedroom? God Fairclough, you 'aven't a clue, 'ave yeh? It's not me yer missin', it's someone to make yer meals, clean for yer, tidy up after yer, wash for yer, run t'Kabin, anybody!""

- Rita Fairclough to Len ""We're like a flamin' see-saw, us two. One up, one down.""

- Elsie Tanner to Len Fairclough ""It's a shame they don't have drive-thru pubs... you wouldn't have to get out of the car then, would ya?""

- Kirk Sutherland ""I could have any man I wanted. Well, any man but you, that is""

- Tracy Barlow to Hayley Cropper ""She's you in a tweed skirt. Neither of you would be able to decide what time it was in a roomful of clocks.""

- Amy Wilton to Derek about Mavis Riley ""There's no getting rid of her, is there? She should be written into the deeds of this place""

- Alec Gilroy about Betty Turpin]]|undefined ""Sour little shrews like you just don't turn him on. Now, run along home. The curtains won't twitch themselves."""

- Eileen Grimshaw to Gail Hillman ""Less bitchin', more stitchin'..""

- Carla Connor to her workforce ""When God made Percy 'e was smiling.'E took two lusty arms and took two sturdy legs and 'e stuck them on the body of my darling. But I think God was barmy, he 'ad made 'im join the Army, where 'e cooked the meals for soldiers and nobody was bolder, 'e cooked curry on the fire and became my hot desire. 'E's got a bird called Randy, and 'e's not the only one. E's always got a smile, and if he wants to, I'll run a mile, and if 'e wants to buy me flowers, 'e can do it anyday, and if 'e wants to misbehave with me, I won't stand in 'is way.""

- Phyllis Pearce's "Ode to Percy" ""And one for the messenger...a glass of arsenic!""

- Len Fairclough buys Hilda Ogden a drink ""Tell me summat, why is your Jack who's supposed to be best man - god 'elp us all - wearing that terrible suit of 'is? You know the one, it's the way I always imagine Engelbert 'umperdink's pyjamas must look.""

- Bet Lynch to Vera Duckworth ""These are Tracy's medical records, showing that when she fell down my stairs - and that's fell folks, not pushed - there were no babies. Now whatever she's been through, and trust me I would not wish that on my worst enemy - which she is by the way - it was nothing to do with me. She'd already lost the babies, Steve, check the dates. Your shiny new wife's a filthy liar.""

- Becky McDonald ""When they come to bury Mrs Tanner, there'll probably be two men fighting at the graveside""

- Annie Walker ""You've been bitten more times than a shark's dinner""

- Betty Williams to Fred Elliott ""There's more rumours than margarine spread around here""

- Valerie Barlow ""I've left home so many times me suitcases pack themselves every time I whistle""

- Elsie Howard ""If Deirdre's guilty of these preposterous allegations then I'm a banana.""

- Emily Bishop ""You've heard of the Bride of Frankenstein? Well I'm the husband of Vera Duckworth""

- Jack Duckworth ""Typical Alec Gilroy - that man's so twisted he could hide behind a spiral staircase""

- Rita Sullivan ""You cancelled my wedding? Try any more stunts like that and I will be booking your funeral!""

- Karen McDonald to Tracy Barlow ""I'm here in this old life, same old Street, having achieved nothing in the past fifty years except a string of embarrassing children who barely know who I am.""

- Ken Barlow ""My first meeting with Dirk was one that would change my life. There I was, at a service station on the M6, with nothing much to look forward to in life anymore, when suddenly I met this man, who has become my friend, and I would even say, my saviour. What was he doing there, well I'm sure Mavis won't mind me mentioning that she'd driven off and forgotten about him. We all have these little lapses in memory, don't we? Anyway, Dirk and I were to become firm friends. Such firm friends, in fact, that I ended up marrying his first wife - who sends her condolences by the way. Now if you were to ask me what were Dirk's main qualities I'd say loyalty, honesty and a fine sense of humour. I remember when Mavis forgot his sixtieth birthday, how he took it in his stride and even saw the funny side, just as he did with all the other ups and downs he encountered.... it has been simply our privilege to have known him""

- Norris Cole's eulogy at Derek Wilton's funeral ""The Barlows will come. There is nothing we can do to stop that now. In the olden days they used to pour boiling oil down upon invaders... I suppose I could heat up the chip fat""

- Roy Cropper ""Mum, I'm a firm believer in marriage. The more the merrier, I reckon. I wonder where I get that from?""

- David Platt to Gail McIntyre ""Isn't Cliff Richard a lovely chubby lad?""

- Minnie Caldwell ""I ask you to find me an act for the old band club, and from what I 'ear you send this old dead 'ead with a voice like a bag 'o crisps!""

- Gus Ferris to Alec Gilroy about Jack Duckworth ""KEN! DO SOMETHING!""

- Deirdre Barlow (on several occasions...) ""I can understand why we won the '14-'18 war, if they were all as insensitive as you they'd have charged at anything!""

- Maggie Clegg to Albert Tatlock ""They played brass bands when we came marching home in 1918. They promised us 'Homes Fit for Heroes' to live in... and Every Man an Acre and a Cow. Well my home's just as it were, my cow never came, they've pinched me allotment and there isn't a Brass Band between here and Belle Vue""

- Albert Tatlock ""It's them out there that want to hurt us. They'll never leave us alone. They'll never let us get on with our lives. And if we can't live together as a family then the only choice is we'll die together as a family.""

- Richard Hillman ""I were fourteen when I first decided me face didn't suit me""

- Hilda Ogden ""I don't expect life to be easy. I'd think very little of it if it was.""

- Ena Sharples ""D'you know he used to win quids off me at snap 'cos I stuttered.""

- Terry Duckworth complains about his upbringing at the hands of his father, Jack ""Summat she didn't say? It's bad enough worrying when people do say things but worrying when they don't it's just throwing your arms around trouble.""

- Irma Barlow ""That's OG, short for Own Goal. It means he did it all by himself, no one else can take the credit for it""

- Des Barnes teaches Raquel Wolstenhulme about football ""A good name that, Spider. You just want to step on him.""

- Fred Elliott about Spider Nugent ""What is it with me and trams?""

- Rita Sullivan ""Drop dead Stan. And then get up and do it again!""

- Hilda Ogden ""You're Norman Bates with a briefcase""

- Gail to Richard Hillman ""All I ever wanted to do is teach, people have died because I wanted to teach. It was meant to be a vocation not a tragedy""

- John Stape ""It was a very long time ago, and I haven’t touched a chainsaw since!""

- Mary Taylor to a policeman ""He's honest, upright, anybody'd tell you that. Nice lad, big act. That is his number because he's desperate for folk to like 'im. They give 'im a pat on the 'ead. A pat on his 'ead and a load on 'is back. You brought your bike in 'ere this mornin', but did you ask me to fix it? Did you 'eck as like, give it to Jerry, give 'im a pat on 'is 'ead and he'll do a lovely job for ye', you know that. He'll spend half his dinner time, 'e will""

- Ray Langton about Jerry Booth ""I wouldn't give 'im the steam off me tea.""

- Maud Grimes about Reg Holdsworth ""If my mum was on her last legs, she’d steal somebody else’s""

- Fiz Brown about Cilla Battersby-Brown ""Now, I’m gonna ask you a question, and I want you to both be honest with me. This is the question: do I look daft? Only, I had a bath last night, right, and then I had a good look at myself in the mirror, and I have to admit, I was shocked. It seemed to me that I look daft, from every conceivable angle - especially upside down""

- Graeme Proctor to David Platt and Tina McIntyre ""D’you know, I reckon there’s a great big poster of you on the wall in the local loony bin, with your mobile number underneath""

- Audrey Roberts to Gail McIntyre ""Flippin' street we live in! Y'ave a bath an' they all know if you get your toe stuck in the plug-hole!""

- David Barlow ""Mrs Ogden has just walked into the living room grinning like an idiot and muttering, "Ignorance is bliss" - if that were the case, of course, she'd be the happiest woman in the world""

- Annie Walker ""I am that skint I'm half expecting Bono to knock on the flipping door and offer to do a concert for us.""

- Steve McDonald ""All my life I’ve had to put up with people being more interested in Christmas than me. What is that about?!""

- Rosie Webster bemoans her date of birth ""Oh, she loves a drama that Gail, never ‘appy unless she’s got someone else’s hands around her throat""

- Blanche Hunt ""You've married foreign once. You could have done it again and got a shop out of it in a divorce settlement.""

- Blanche Hunt to Deirdre Rachid ""This is for me job interview." Liz McDonald showing off a low-cut dress "What job?" Tracy Barlow "Prostitute." Blanche Hunt" ""Do you think Ken wants to stare at thongs all day? The man's an intellectual.""

- Blanche Hunt to Liz McDonald ""Cometh the hour, Deirdre, cometh the woman: cometh Blanche Hunt.""

- Blanche Hunt ""You screw this deal up and you'll never clean a lavatory in this town again""

- Mike Baldwin to Harry Flagg ""No, he doesn't really swallow them... it won't put the punters off... your sales of chicken in a basket will not plummet... no, it is not cruel to the hamsters, why it's the best act since Murphy's Educated Chickens.""

- Alec Gilroy making a phone call to try and get someone to book a disappearing hamster act ""Large weedkiller is it, for a large weed?""

- Bet Lynch serving Mike Baldwin in the Rovers ""I live in a very funny area, me. I'm quite normal compared to most of them who live round our way.""

- Vera Duckworth ""There are no dungarees in this house, thank you very much!""

- Sally Webster ""They're so attentive in the hotel. Do you know I rang him once and the girl from room service was there in the bedroom to answer the phone.""

- Raquel Wolstenhulme on her attempts to contact footballer boyfriend Wayne Farrell ""Me mother said I was to save meself. And I saved meself till the danger was completely passed.""

- Mavis Riley ""Come on ladies, grasp it firmly - it's a horn of plenty!""

- Reg Holdsworth as Bachus on a carnival float ""You know Sophie Webster? She’s Lebanese""

- Tyrone Dobbs ""We don't sympathise with people round 'ere, you know. We understand them, and that's very different""

- Len Fairclough ""In darkest Africa they use a set of drums. Here we've got Hilda Ogden. I suppose that's civilisation""

- Renee Bradshaw ""You know sometimes I think I'm just about ready to go off down to that cemetery, but if I had my way I'd just like to go like me mother did." Ena Sharples "Ee, that were a beautiful ending." Martha Longhurst "Oh, lovely. She just sat up, broke wind and died." Ena Sharples" ""When that madam is not chasing men, she's chasing money and Mike Baldwin is a combined operation.""

- Ivy Brennan about Alma Sedgewick ""You haven't heard about the time she used real toads in Toad In The Hole? And poor Jack's never been the same since she did coq au vin...""

- Kevin Webster about Vera Duckworth's cooking ""When I were 'is age, I 'ad to beat 'em off with a stick! And I didn't 'ave a car! No, all's I 'ad was an old rubber tire I used to roll down the street. Eventually, I got a clapped-out old banger. Oh, not a car. Our Vera, I'm talkin' about.""

- Jack Duckworth ""By 'eck you don't get much do you?! And there's leaves, leaves on me plate! The chef must have left the back door open, and they've blown over it, leaves!!""

- Eric Gartside complaining about a restaurant's nouvelle cuisine ""Frank Bradley's just a load of rubbish – with a nice face on top""

- Lucille Hewitt ""Take no notice. She's got geriatric Tourette's.""

- Deirdre Barlow about Blanche Hunt ""Sarah can have a child any time she likes. Thirteen years old, no problem. But the spawn of David? God forbid!""

- David Platt ""Sleeping with you will undoubtedly make the rest of my day a total joy....... after all, I feel like I've got the worst of the day's chores over with""

- Tracy Barlow to Charlie Stubbs ""Hey Jack, you should be used to wearing a dress. It's obvious you don't wear the trousers at home""

- Fiz Brown ""I killed for you, Gail! Would any man you've ever known do that? Did Brian or Martin love you that much? They didn't even love you enough to stay with you. They betrayed you, like most men do, with their seedy little affairs. I would never do that to you, if you live for a thousand years, you'll never find anyone who loves you more than me.""

- Richard Hillman ""Then there's the flatulence - it's making a right misery of my social life, I don't know which way to turn.""

- Les Battersby defends himself in court ""Boring. It's the 'in' word isn't it? Anything isn't with it, swinging or trendy it's boring. I'm boring! And there's nothing I can do about it because the great tragedy is that I'm not aware of it. I happen to think that I'm a great guy.""

- Ken Barlow ""I heat up in the night so I like as few layers as possible. I just lie there stroking my mu-mu till I fall asleep""

- Mary Taylor ""I've never cracked it, you see. You've got to 'av an idea. Like the apple fell on Shakespeare's 'ead. Eureka 'e said""

- Stan Ogden ""I never fitted in in this Street because I never wanted to. I despised round 'ere. The littleness of it, the dinginess, the acceptance that this was all there ever was or ever would be. Streets like this suck you down to their level in time""

- Janet Barlow ""I remember seeing someone on Parkinson, I think it might have been Dame Judi Dench, well she said that she vomited before every performance and had to keep a bucket in the wing. If that's good enough for Dame Judi, then it's good enough for Rosie Webster""

- Sally Webster gives her daughter a pep talk ""The woman's a younger version of Vera Duckworth. Only not as classy""

- Mavis Wilton about Tricia Armstrong ""You've heard of the face that launched a thousand ships? It was my mother's voice that sunk 'em""

- Irma Barlow about Hilda Ogden ""If all goes well, in future she'll be taking a lot of my sausage""

- Fred Elliott on a business deal... ""You're in a tizzy. Your nostrils are that flared you could park a bus up 'em""

- Rita Sullivan o Mavis Wilton ""I've never been so insulted. Outside my marriage that is..""

- Norris Cole ""Gail Potter, I sometimes think your mouth'd make a good bus stop""

- Tricia Hopkins ""Duckworth - his name's Duckworth - but we're thinking of changing it to Pillock!""

- Vera Duckworth to a policeman who has stopped her and Jack for speeding ""You know Stanley, there's three types of idle: Idle, flamin' idle and you!""

- Eddie Yeats ""The purpose of football is to score goals, right? Well it's daft, you see. You've got two teams on the field and they're both kicking in opposite directions. Why don't they both kick the same way? Then they can score as many goals as they like""

- Raquel Wolstenhulme ""Son, brother, husband... lover. Roadkill. Looks like the best man lost!""

- Tony Gordon to a dying Liam Connor ""I want to thank Hayley, for stepping into my life, and bringing to me a happiness, and a love that I had always thought was meant for other people, and never for someone like me. Thank you Hayley.""

- Roy Cropper ""I got Tracy Barlow pregnant who stalked me and then cancelled my wedding behind me back. I've got a baby daughter nobody knows about that's being looked after by the Croppers. Roy thinks he's the father and so does his transsexual partner Hayley""

- Steve McDonald outlines his troubles to his brother Andy ""Support groups? In my day when summat bad happened you stayed at home, got drunk and bit on a shoe.""

- Blanche Hunt ""Rickets, TB, rations: those were the days.""

- Blanche Hunt ""If you're not being talked about in this pub, you're not worth serving.""

- Betty Turpin ""To look at him you'd think he was really stable and reliable and everything, the sort of person they love giving mortgages to. But his life's a total mess.""

- Alma Sedgewick about Ken Barlow ""The angry young man who turned into the slightly peeved old man. Not so much look back in anger as look back in a rather bad mood""

- Mel Hutchwright, about Ken Barlow ""One does get rather tired of this dreary landscape. This desert of bricks and cobbled streets. Blackened chimneys piercing the sultry sky like jagged teeth""

- Annie Walker ""Well it's a rough old pub and it needs a rough old bird to keep charge of it.""

- Mike Baldwin ""When you've made gravy under gunfire you can do anything""

- Percy Sugden ""I always fall in love too easy. It's since I was a kid and saw Aqua Marina on Stingray. That puppet nearly broke my heart. Looking back it never would have worked. I was a schoolboy, she was made of wood. I could have got some splinters in some very awkward places. And to be honest, I prefer a relationship with no strings""

- Graeme Proctor ""I've always wanted to be stormy, passionate and tempestuous. But you can't be. Not when you're born with a tidy mind.""

- Emily Bishop ""For Bettabuys' sake, you are going to take that bull by the horns, wipe the slate clean with it, and turn over a sparkling new penny - have I made myself clear?""

- Reg Holdsworth to Curly Watts ""I was really something when I was young. A different lad every night of the week, they queued up just to walk me 'ome from work. An' then the dance 'alls... 'Ow I come to throw meself away on a nothin' like Arnold Tanner I'll never know. I could 'ave done anythin'. Got anywhere. I don't just mean fellers. I mean life generally. I was a fighter...I walked down this street last night in the pourin' rain an cried...for a girl 'oo once 'ad guts, and hope...only she's dead now. I'm not sure just when it was she died.""

- Elsie Tanner ""I know folk think I'm simple. What I say to them is that I'd rather be simple and 'ave me pleasures than know everything and be miserable, like Ena""

- Minnie Caldwell ""The scent... it's everywhere. Between her and Bet my nasal passages are in rags. Absolute rags.""

- Alec Gilroy on Raquel Wolstenhulme ""It's at times like this I can understand why some animals eat their young.""

- Gail Platt ""You've got as much chance of keeping a secret round 'ere as you have of keeping a tan""

- Bet Lynch ""If my wife put her mind to it, she could find reasons why Mary and Joseph were unfit parents""

- Don Brennan about Ivy ""You're remarkably chipper. Trod on a snail?""

- Blanche Hunt to Tracy Barlow ""Elsie Tanner's heart is where a feller's wallet is - and the bigger the wallet, the more heart she's got.""

- Hilda Ogden ""Tracy Barlow! I mean, even her initials are a killer disease!""

- Eileen Grimshaw ""Ken'll only go down on one knee so many times. In fact, if you leave it much longer he won't be able to get up again without help, so think on...""

- Blanche Hunt to Deirdre Rachid ""I don't have any truck with tank-tops. They're unmanly""

- Blanche Hunt ""It's a funny looking thermometer this" Peter Barlow "It's rectal, but its been through the dishwasher" Blanche Hunt" ""You've a mean streak in you Deirdre and I don't know where you get it from!""

- Blanche Hunt ""Dedicated to grinding the faces of the working classes and laughing all the way to the bank. Now that's what I call job satisfaction""

- Alec Gilroy on Mike Baldwin ""Good looks are a curse. You and Kenneth should count yourselves very lucky""

- Blanche Hunt to Deirdre Barlow ""Cut glass on the outside and broken glass inside""

- Albert Tatlock about Annie Walker ""Natalie Barnes is that hard-faced, if she fell on the pavement she'd crack a flag.""

- Vera Duckworth ""They can take neither your bed nor the tools of your trade." Martha Longhurst "In't case of Elsie Tanner, it's one an't same thing..." Ena Sharples" ""There was life before "Coronation Street", but it didn't add up to much.""

- Russell Harty ""Manchester produces what to me is "The Pickwick Papers", that is to say "Coronation Street". Mondays and Wednesdays I live for them.""

- John Betjeman ""...the greatest TV show on the planet.""

- Grace Dent, The Guardian [ Refresh for another quote]