I'm an only child so am happy with my own company and I don't really get lonely.

I don't really do themes. I might accidentally, but themes are an emergent phenomena of the writing of the book, of just trying to get a story out there.

What is any achievement, however great it was, once time itself is dead?

All you ever were was a little bit of the universe, thinking to itself. Very specific; this bit, here, right now. All the rest was fantasy.

A lot of what the 'Culture' is about is a reaction to all the science fiction I was reading in my very early teens.

In so much of politics you're not allowed to disagree with what's been agreed.

Intellectual achievement. The exercise of skill. Human feeling.