Alan Davies quotes from QI

Stephen Fry

Do you know what the French for "flying fish" is?

Alan Davies

Poisson … d'aeroplane …?

It's a shame it doesn't make any difference, because I've been using the fact that I don't shave my legs as an excuse for going five hours slower than the guy who won.

Stephen Fry

Which stage did you do?

There's an open stage every year. An amateur stage. You do it two weeks before they do it. Eight thousand of us, and by the end, there were four thousand of us left at the end of it. I started in 2400th place, and I finished in 3400th place.

Stephen Fry

Oh no.

Alan Davies

You mean a thousand people overtook you?

I was passed by a thousand people. And it took me... it took eleven hours to do this stage. The winner of the actual proper stage when they did it the next week was a guy called Vinokourov, I think his name was. He did it in five hours, but he was using someone else’s blood. And he was thrown out of the stage that night for blood doping.

Phill Jupitus

[Laughing.] Someone else’s blood!

But it took me nine hours to catch up to the bloke with the one leg.

Phill Jupitus

[on the Bayeux Tapestry] That says 'Wil 6 Elm'.

Alan Davies

Normmano. I like that.

Phill Jupitus

Is that like medieval text speak? They never put the whole thing in. They just sort of... C U l8er.

Alan Davies

We have been con-kered

Phill Jupitus

'We've invaded Britain. lol'

Stephen Fry

O … M … G! Very good.

Jimmy Carr

It can mimic anything? I'd make it woof. How funny would that be, if you had a bird that woofed?

Alan Davies

I'd get it to do limericks.

Marcus Brigstocke

I'd probably get it to do Bill Oddie.

Stephen Fry

Surely that would be a bearded tit, if it was anything.

Alan Davies

You're thinking of Rory McGrath.

Stephen Fry

The Eiffel Tower. They loathed it. Guy de Maupassant loathed it so much that his favourite restaurant was …?

Alan Davies

The "Eiffel Tower is Crap" Bistro.

Stephen Fry

No, it was in the Eiffel Tower.

Alan Davies

Oh, so he didn't have to look at it.

Stephen Fry

So—exactly. The one place in Paris he couldn't see the Eiffel Tower was inside the Eiffel Tower.

Marcus Brigstocke

Could he not maybe just ask for a chair facing the other way?

Stephen Fry

He was a French writer trying to make a point, and therefore a git.

Alan Davies

I put it in the bath?

Stephen Fry

Mm, yeah...

Jimmy Carr

What, does gold go small and wrinkly in the bath?

Sean Lock

That's your crown jewels!

Stephen Fry

So this particular man, Archimedes, pondering this problem that he’d been given by the king gets in the bath, sees the water rise, and leaps out of the bath shouting...

Alan Davies

Eureka!

Stephen Fry

Exactly.

Sean Lock

I really thought you were gonna say ‘Arsenal!’ then, Alan.

Stephen Fry

In this episode, there is a special forfeit if you use a particular F word...

Jo Brand

Oh, fuck off.

Stephen Fry

It was almost a clever double-bluff that it would be that word.

Stephen Fry

Alan, do you enjoy fargling?

Alan Davies

Am I fargling now?

Stephen Fry

No.

Stephen Fry

What's the ideal way to kiss a Frenchman?

Alan Davies

A French man? [laughing] I don't know. With their consent?

Stephen Fry

Very well put! What a nice young man.

Alan Davies

If you're unsure about whether to do one cheek or two, best way to deal with it is to cup their genitals while you're doing it, and they won't mind how many kisses.

Stephen Fry

[laughing] Cup their genitals! After the words "Carry your bag, sir?"

Alan Davies

They had vacuum cleaners in America in the 19th century, and they were huge, and they had to go on the back of a car drawn by horses.

Stephen Fry

[pedantic] I remember seeing that on a programme called QI! ...But well remembered!

Stephen Fry

Now. Picture the scene. I'm out windsurfing. The breeze is ruffling my trousers and sun-bleached hair. I look up, and I see on the horizon a ship. How far away is it?

Alan Davies

Twenty-one miles.

Stephen Fry

No.

Alan Davies

I thought it was always twenty-one miles.

Stephen Fry

No.

Alan Davies

I didn't even get flagged for that.

Stephen Fry

No, no, I didn't know that anybody always thought that it was twenty-one miles.

Stephen Fry

Do you know the difference between a frog and a toad?

Alan Davies

Spelling.

Stephen Fry

What do you call a slug with a shell?

Alan Davies

I’m not falling for that one.

Stephen Fry

[to Emma Thompson, about her pubic hair] Do you wax yourself down there, dovey?

Emma Thompson

[gets up intimidatingly] Do you want to see?

Stephen Fry

[collapses] No! I don't want to see! No, I do not. Oh, God!

Emma Thompson

You know I'd do it.

Stephen Fry

I know you would. She'd envelope me in her skirt.

Alan Davies

Lock the doors! Lock the doors! Ye of faint of heart, leave immediately!