I said to myself, 'If you don't sit down to it today, when will you ever sit down to it?'

Some years ago I wrote a book called The House on Eccles Street. To write this book I had to think my way into the existence of Marion Bloom...Marion Bloom was a figment of James Joyce's imagination. If I can think my way into the existence of a being who has never existed, then I can think my way into the existence of a bat or a chimpanzee or an oyster, any being with whom I share the substrate of life.

The spark of true poetry flashes when ideas are juxtaposed that no one has yet thought of bringing together.

In my experience poetry speaks to you either at first sight or not at all. A flash of revelation and a flash of response. Like lightning. Like falling in love.

It gets harder all the time, Bev Shaw once said. Harder, yet easier. One gets used to things getting harder; one ceases to be surprised that what used to be hard as hard can be grows harder yet.

In order to be cruel we have to close our hearts to the suffering of the other.

I said to myself, 'If you don't sit down to it today, when will you ever sit down to it?'