My role in society, or any artist's or poet's role, is to try and express what we all feel. Not to tell people how to feel. Not as a preacher, not as a leader, but as a reflection of us all.

I was trying to say something about Christianity, the idea that you have to be tortured to attain heaven. I didn't believe that.

Nobody controls me. I'm uncontrollable. The only one who can control me is me, and even that's barely possible.

I put things down on sheets of paper and stuff them in my pockets. When I have enough, I have a book.

To begin with, working class people reacted against our openness about sex. They are frightened of nudity, they're repressed in that way as well as others. Perhaps they thought 'Paul [McCartney] is a good lad, he doesn't make trouble'.

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

I didn't really know that much about the Maoists, but I just knew that they seemed to be so few and yet they painted themselves green and stood in front of the police waiting to get picked off.