You learn nothing about men by snubbing them and crushing their pride. You must ask them what it is they can do in this world, that they alone can do.

If the monarchy were removed tomorrow, it wouldn't have a huge effect on the national mind-set. The monarchy is mildly interesting and largely harmless. I can't find I can get very heated about it. In the next couple of generations, it is bound to go. There is so much else in the world that is more interesting.

When I began to read as an adult, I read almost exclusively novelists of a generation back. I did the Russians, then I started getting more up to date. When you become published and become a reviewer, piles of books come along and you are pushed by fashion and what you are commissioned to do.

What is it we are hating? It goes beyond politics. I suppose that my fascination with [Margaret Thatcher] is not just with her political record but with her as a phenomenon.

[Margaret Thatcher] scorned and despised other women, and predicated her values entirely on the values of her father, a small town shopkeeper.

If I am feeling broken, I can pick up one of [Ivy Compton-Burnett] books and the next morning I can write again. It puts my mechanism back.

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