I used to hide my real emotions in gobbledegook, like in In His Own Write. When I wrote teenage poems, I wrote in gobbledegook because I was always hiding my real emotions from Mimi.

The first drugs I ever took, I was still at art school, with the group - we all took it together - was Benzedrine from the inside of an inhaler.

I'm not afraid of death because I don't believe in it. It's just getting out of one car, and into another

Count your age by friends, not years. Count your life by smiles, not tears.

I believe time wounds all heels.

That radicalism (of the '70s) was phony, really, because it was out of guilt. I'd always felt guilty that I made money, so I had to give it away or lose it. I don't mean I was a hypocrite. When I believe, I believe right down to the roots.

We never write anything with themes. We just write the same rubbish all the time.