When I came to England it wasn't what it is now, then the black people were very rarely strong. I had a personal shock because England wasn't what I expected it to be... where people lived like Jane Austen.

I was a threat to a lot of women and to a lot of men. The women cannot forgive me if I remain single and also have a family. But I have a family as well and am raising them. A lot of women only stay in their marriages because of the children so seeing me on my own annoys them.

In all my novels, I deal with the many problems and prejudices which exist for Black people in Britain today.

Men blackmailing you as a woman leads you to trivialise sex and say 'it's not important, what is important is myself as a person, no one owns me because of sex.'

I came to England in 1962 as a very young bride, in my teens, hoping just to stay two years and go back.

Being a woman writer, I would be deceiving myself if I said I write completely through the eye of a man. There's nothing bad in it, but that does not make me a feminist writer. I hate that name. The tag is from the Western world - like we are called the Third World.

When I came to England it wasn't what it is now, then the black people were very rarely strong. I had a personal shock because England wasn't what I expected it to be... where people lived like Jane Austen.