I mean I think that's a fact and I think that we had a very peculiar type of Catholic Church here in that it was a fortress Church.

I think there's a great difference in consciousness in that same way in that when we're young we read books for the story, for the excitement of the story - and there comes a time when you realise that all stories are more or less the same story.

Among its many other obligations, fiction always has to be believable. Life does not have to suffer such constraint, and much of what takes place is believable only because it happens.

The imagination demands that life be told slant because of its need of distance.

I'd much prefer to write more quickly.

I belong to the middle class that grew up very influenced by the Catholic church. The people of the novel are from a more pagan and practical world in which the Christianity is just a veneer.

Yes, though I have nothing but gratitude for my upbringing in the church.