People fail you, children disappoint you, thieves break in, moths corrupt, but an Order of the British Empire goes on for ever.

Writing is an act of generosity toward other people.

Confidence is something one acquires. It can come early or late but it is impossible to write without it. Mine came late.

Beauty is the first present nature gives to women and the first it takes away.

Youth gives a sense of new days dawning bright, going on for ever, and a kind of tamped-down excitement which keeps breaking through even the worst days of poverty, depression and loneliness. But then youth is something which only exists in retrospect; you are barely conscious of it while you have it.

As it has turned out, the whole relationship between men, women and children has tilted, to the disadvantage of women.

It is easier for the reader to judge, by a thousand times, than for the writer to invent. The writer must summon his Idea out of nowhere, and his characters out of nothing, and catch words as they fly, and nail them to the page. The reader has something to go by and somewhere to start from, given to him freely and with great generosity by the writer. And still the reader feels free to find fault.