Quotes from Nina Conti

My puppets are far more liberated than I am. Ventriloquism is a useful way of expressing myself.

I looked into studying psychoanalysis, wrote to the governing body and was about to start the year where they psychoanalyse you, four times a week, before you get to do it yourself. I just thought I'd taken the ventriloquism as far as I could. My act is so deconstructive, and I'd made all the monkey jokes anyone wanted to hear.

I do laugh when I hear myself saying, 'I am a ventriloquist.' I am definitely suited to it, though. I took it and ran with it quite hungrily. It is not for everyone, but it is just the chance to write for a character.

I make napkins talk in restaurants, socks talk on car journeys. There is an awful lot of puppetry going on in the house.