Image copyright Getty Images Image caption Joan Rivers was a purveyor of the no holds barred put-down

US comedian Joan Rivers has died at the age of 81. Throughout her career, she was renowned for her many acid-tongued pearls of wit which took swipes at other celebrities but also turned inwardly, mocking her own later penchant for plastic surgery.

She once said: "Never be afraid to laugh at yourself, after all, you could be missing out on the joke of the century."

Here is a selection of her best one-liners.

ON PLASTIC SURGERY

"I wish I had a twin, so I could know what I'd look like without plastic surgery."

"I've had so much plastic surgery, when I die they will donate my body to Tupperware."

"I am definitely going to watch the Emmys this year! My make-up team is nominated for Best Special Effects."

"Looking 50 is great - if you're 60."

"The only way I can get a man to touch me at this age is plastic surgery."

ON GETTING OLDER

"You know why I feel older? I went to buy sexy underwear and they automatically gift wrapped it."

"I said to my husband, 'my boobs have gone, my stomach's gone, say something nice about my legs'. He said, "Blue goes with everything."

"When a man has a birthday, he takes a day off. When a woman has a birthday, she takes at least three years off."

"You know you've reached middle age when you're cautioned to slow down by your doctor, instead of by the police."

"I must admit I'm nervous about getting Alzheimer's. Once it hits, I might tell my best joke and never know it."

"The fashion magazines are suggesting that women wear clothes that are 'age appropriate'. For me that would be a shroud."

ON OTHER CELEBRITIES

"Elizabeth Taylor was so fat that whenever she went to London in a red dress, 30 passengers would try to board her."

"At my funeral, I want Meryl Streep crying in five different accents."

ON RELATIONSHIPS

"I said to my husband, 'Why don't you call out my name when we're making love?'. He said, "I don't want to wake you up."

"I got a waterbed, but my husband stocked it with trout."

"My best birth control now is just to leave the lights on."

"My husband killed himself. And it was my fault. We were making love and I took the bag off my head."

"Trust your husband, adore your husband, and get as much as you can in your own name."

"My daughter and I are very close, we speak every single day and I call her every day and I say the same thing: 'Pick up, I know you're there.'"

"When I was born, my mother asked the doctor: 'Will she live?'. He said, 'Only if you take your foot off her throat'."