Dolly Parton hasn't "got time to get old"

She told People magazine: "People say, 'Well, you're going to be 80 years old.' Well, so what? Look at all I've done in 80 years. I feel like I'm just getting started.

"I know that sounds stupid, but unless my health gives way, which right now I seem to be doing fine . . . I think there's a lot to be said about age. If you allow yourself to get old, you will. I say, 'I ain't got time to get old!' I ain't got time to dwell on that. That's not what I'm thinking about."

Dolly - whose husband Carl Dean died earlier this year - has been reflecting on how much she has "sacrificed" for the sake of her career over the years.

Reflecting on her new book, Star of the Show: My Life on Stage , she said: "You know, I have just been going so fast my whole life.

"And I just start thinking, 'How in the world did I even have a life? How did I even get it done?' I really realised when I was putting this book together just how much I had sacrificed in my life.

"I never had children, so at least I didn't have a guilty feeling. I'm thankful that I got to see my dreams come true."

The 9 to 5 hitmaker has faced sexism throughout her career but has never let that put her off trying new things in the public eye.

She said: "You have to grow into things, and you have to grow out of things; that's how I handled my career.

"I needed to try things. A lot of people think because you're a girl, you don't always know what you're doing. I don't care about what other people are doing. I only care about what I need to be doing.

"I don't try to tell other people how to do it, how to be, but I know who I am.

"I'm a star to everybody but me. I'm just a working girl. I always just say that I'm a workhorse that looks like a show horse."