The Irish have a flair for wringing from death the last drop of emotion and they do not quite understand those who react otherwise.

To me writing was not a career but a necessity. And so it remains, though I am now, technically, a professional writer. The strength of this inborn desire to write has always baffled me. It is understandable that the really gifted should feel an overwhelming urge to use their gift; but a strong urge with only a slight gift seems almost a genetic mistake.

... strong bonds are forged in high emotional temperatures.

On my tenth birthday a bicycle and an atlas coincided as presents and a few days later I decided to cycle to India.

Buying a bicycle is a momentous event, akin to marriage: you are acquiring a partner.

Undoubtedly the Afghans must be, by our standards, the best-looking people in the world. They have everything; height, proportions, carriage, features and complexion.

Without evading the grimness of life in much of modern Africa, one can recognize that this continent is not yet sick as our continent is sick. Most Africans remain plugged into reality. In contrast we have become disconnected from it, reduced to compulsively consuming units, taught to worship 'economic growth' - the ultimate unreality in a finite world.