By the tits of Holy Agnes

You mustn't stand about. Come home with me to dinner.’ ‘No.’ More shakes his head. ‘I would rather be blown around on the river and go home hungry. If I could trust you only to put food in my mouth – but you will put words into it.

I do myself think that history is a set of skills rather than a narrative.

But an experienced reader is also a self-aware and critical reader. I can't remember ever reading a story without judging it.

I think psychologically [Margaret Thatcher] is really worth studying. I am reading Charles Moore's biography of her, and he has gotten us right there with a woman who lived the unexamined life, and lived it deliberately, and who has contempt for history, even her own.

I am usually protective of my work, not showing it to anyone until it has been redrafted and polished.

If you have a good story idea, don't assume it must form a prose narrative. It may work better as a play, a screenplay or a poem. Be flexible.