I work very deliberately, with a plan. But sometimes I come to a point that I planned as the end and it needs softening. Ending a novel is almost like putting a child to sleep - it can't be done abruptly.

Between the ages of 8 and 12 it was difficult to know what my father was saying, and he moved very slowly, and then he died.

Writer's block! It doesn't exist. You just long for ideas to go away so you have an idea of peace.

I have to write a first draft with a fountain pen before I type it up as a second.

I first went to Barcelona in 1975 after university, and I stayed for three years. I learnt Catalan because that's what everyone speaks in the mountains. They speak English to foreigners, but what people say to each other is much more important than what they say to you.

Life has a funny way of becoming ordinary as soon as it can.

I think you can get a sort of intensity and an edginess offering nine stories in a book. Competing versions of things.