My sister-in-law believes that few narratives are so tightly constructed that you can't skip boring bits and still keep abreast of what's going on.

I couldn't really see the point of having lunch unless it started at 1:00 and ended a week later in Monte Carlo.

After you've read a novel, you only retain a vague memory of its contents. You remember the atmosphere, the odd image or phrase or vivid cameo.

My sister-in-law believes that few narratives are so tightly constructed that you can't skip boring bits and still keep abreast of what's going on.

I like doing things I haven't learnt about yet. I've always been interested in art, and I love doing art.

It was Julie Burchill who decreed that, beyond a certain age, a man should not be seen in a leather jacket.

Global warming, the ongoing destruction of the planet, Third World debt, the uselessness of the railways, the takeover by the corporations, the scary George Bush person: all these things are important and should be animating me into outrage. Yet somehow they do not.