I see the author as the person who has written; the writer, the one involved in the process of writing. And they're not necessarily friends. The writer is the one I want to reinforce; the author would just feed on the reviews - so I'm in favour of starving him.

It's no use imagining that bringing great writers together inevitably precipitates great conversation.

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

I'm really not responsible for what mental operation people have when they're reading my books other than the ones which are created by literary effects.

Well, the attractive thing about the subject of happiness is that it is notoriously difficult to write.

Surely: the adverb of a man without an argument.

Detachment is what interests me, seeing how people couldn't have been any other way, how they were the product of forces that they had no control over.