People never remeber happiness with the care that they lavish on preserving every detail of their suffering.

The Booker 2011 is of no more interest to me than the world heavyweight championship, which I'm not going to win either. It's irrelevant.

Everything was usual. That was depression: being stuck, clinging to an out-of-date version of oneself.

The thing about the 'Melrose' novels is that I have to feel they're impossible when I set out.

Proust is a hero of mine. I read 'A la recherche' in one go, and I'm a very slow reader. It had an astonishing impact, reading it on my own and being my main company. I think Proust is the most intelligent person to ever have written a novel.

I think that some laughter comes from escaped horror, doesn't it?

It seems people spend the majority of their lives believing they're dying, with the only consolation being that at one point they get to be right.