All of my life had been spent in the shadow of apartheid. And when South Africa went through its extraordinary change in 1994, it was like having spent a lifetime in a boxing ring with an opponent and suddenly finding yourself in that boxing ring with nobody else and realising you've to take the gloves off and get out and reinvent yourself.

I'm giving up acting. . . . I'm 66 and there are a number of celebrations I've got to get down on paper, and acting doesn't allow me to do that. It was a hell of a drug, performance. It's a great thrill, especially for a storyteller. But it can go. Directing can go. Writing can't go. And in terms of what lies ahead, I want to have a burning focus - almost like smoke coming up from the paper as I write.

You can't answer violence with counter violence ... The answer is love. The best sabotage is love.

Love is the only energy I’ve ever used as a writer. I’ve never written out of anger, although anger has informed love.

Every boy needs a role model that he can be proud of and talk about to the other kids in the playground.

The things that converge in the writing of a play come from a complex of motives, a genesis shrouded in a certain kind of mystery.

A very close friend of mine keeps reminding me that since about the age of 50, I've been saying, 'I'm finished. I haven't got another one in me.' But somehow you do.