Hymns are the poetry of the people.

I have a Vision of the Future, chum. The workers flats in fields of soya beans tower up like silver pencils, score on score.

Hymn tunes are the nearest we've got to English folk music.

Topography is one of my chief themes in my poetry, about the country, the suburbs and the seaside. Then there comes love... and increasingly; the fear of death.

Norfolk would not be Norfolk without a church tower on the horizon or round a corner up a lane. We cannot spare a single Norfolk church. When a church has been pulled down the country seems empty or is like a necklace with a jewel missing.

And I think it was the outline of that church tower at Belaugh against the sky which gave me a passion for churches so that every church I've past since I've wanted to stop and look in.

On out deathbeds we're not going to regret all the work we didn't do. We're going to regret all the sex we didn't have!