The longer I practise medicine, the more convinced I am there are only two types of cases: those that involve taking the trousers off and those that don't.

You don't put your life into your books, you find it there.

There's very little in the substance of [THE LADY IN THE VAN] which is not fact though some adjustments have had to be made. Over the years Miss Shepherd was visited by a succession of social workers so the character in the play is a composite figure. . . . A composite too are the neighbours, Pauline and Rufus, though I have made Rufus a publisher in remembrance of my neighbour, the late Colin Haycraft, the proprietor of Duckworth's.

You always know when you're going to arrive. If you go by car, you don't. Apart from anything else, I prefer cycling. It puts you in a good mood, I find.

No mention of God. They keep Him up their sleeves for as long as they can, vicars do. They know it puts people off.

Those who have known the famous are publicly debriefed of their memories, knowing as their own dusk falls that they will only be remembered for remembering someone else.

Books are not about passing the time. They're about other lives. Other worlds.