"Freddie was having radiation therapy but he had to do that about 5:30 or 6 o’clock in the morning because it had to be done at the hospital, it could not be done at home. But it had to be done when few people as possible were around to see him going in there. Yet he would still go home, have a couple of hours rest and go and make music."
— Peter Freestone, Freddie’s personal assistant
"It may sound strange, but one of the things people never noticed was that he was unbelievably modest and shy. Freddie loved to be in love. In his best time he would write a song in a few minutes, but when he was in love, it was even faster. When he was depressed, he couldn’t write a thing, and really, there aren’t any truly sad Queen songs."
— Reinhold Mack, Queen’s producer
"Of course I would like to have children, I’m just being very frivolous and flippant. But yes I would - with the right girl."
— Freddie Mercury, 1985.
"I’ve personally had it with these bombastic lights and staging effects, I don’t think a 42-year old man should be running around in his leotard anymore."
— Freddie Mercury, 1988.
"We were with him a lot in the final days but it wasn’t a question of saying goodbye, it was a question of just sharing a moment. I remember an occasion when he was lying in bed and he couldn’t see out into his garden very well. We were talking about his plants, which he loved. Actually Anita and I were there. He said, “Guys, don’t feel like you have to entertain me. Just you being here is what’s important and I’m enjoying that.” So I think, in a way, that was him - amazingly - finding acceptance of the way things were. So, no, the word “goodbye” didn’t happen but we reached a very peaceful place."
— Brian May on Freddie’s last days
“I wore Zandra Rhodes dresses and painted my fingernails black, and I wore eye makeup and had long hair. I wore women’s blouses and then I would walk into a room and close it dead.”
Freddie Mercury
"I remember back in an interview where I said, ‘I play on the bisexual thing.’ Of course I play on it. It’s simply a matter of wherever my mood takes me. If people ask me if I’m gay, I tell them it’s up to them to find out."
— Freddie Mercury
"It was August 18, 1990. We were sitting in Freddie’s bedroom having coffee, when he said suddenly, “What you have to understand, my dear Kash, is that what I have is terminal. I’m going to die.” We saw these marks on his ankles and knew he was ill. After that, we talked no more about it."
— Kashmira Cooke, Freddie’s sister
"Freddie was no fickle friend. I can’t think of one short-term friendship he had. When you were Freddie’s friend, that meant for life."
— Peter Freestone, Freddie’s personal assistant
"My lyrics and songs are mainly fantasies, I make them up. They are not down to earth, they’re kind of airy-fairy really. I’m not one of those writers who walks out onto the street and is suddenly inspired by a vision, and I’m not one of those people who wants to go on safari to get inspiration from wild animals around me, or go up onto mountain tops or things like that. No, I can get inspiration just sitting in the bath."
— Freddie Mercury
"He never asked for sympathy from anyone else. He was a very strong person and always liked to be in control of his own destiny. He knew that if he did announce it his life would become a circus and he would be prevented from going about his business, which was making music. He wanted it to be business as usual until the end. There was no drama, no tears in his eyes. He was incredibly self-contained."
— Brian May on Freddie’s last years
"Barbara and I have formed a bond that is stronger than anything I’ve had with a lover for the last six years. I can really talk to her and be myself in a way that’s very rare."
— Freddie Mercury, 1985.
"Freddie wasn’t about categories and limitations and he didn’t believe that what he did in bed necessarily reflected who he was. When he was asked about his sexuality he’d always respond differently. I remember in one interview he said ‘you know I’m as gay as a daffodil’ and in another he said ‘I sleep with men, women and my cats.’ He created a life for himself that was free of those constraints, even though society then wasn’t as tolerant as it is twenty years later."
— Peter Freestone
"Bohemian Rhapsody” didn’t just come out of thin air. I did a bit of research, although it was tongue in cheek and it was mock opera. Why not? I certainly wasn’t saying I was an opera fanatic and I knew everything about it."
— Freddie Mercury
"Freddie was fully focused, never allowing anything or anyone to get in the way of his vision for the future. He was truly a free spirit. There are not many of these in the world. To achieve this, you have to be, like Freddie, fearless—unafraid of upsetting anyone’s apple cart."
— Brian May
