I quizzed him a lot on this point and i suspect the truth was that it was like a lot of things at that age: you don't have any clear reason, you just do it. You do it because you think it might get a laugh, or because you want to see if it'll cause a stir. And when you're asked to explain afterwards, it doesn't seem to make any sense.

There was another life that I might have had, but I am having this one.

The Booker triumph of Graham Swift's moving, effortlessly profound Last Orders is a vindication of the quiet, much-misunderstood path this fine writer chose to take after the brilliance of Waterland more than ten years ago.

I half closed my eyes and imagined this was the spot where everything I'd ever lost since my childhood had washed up, and I was now standing here in front of it, and if I waited long enough, a tiny figure would appear on the horizon across the field and gradually get larger until I'd see it was Tommy, and he'd wave, and maybe even call.

When I see films made from books, I make a huge effort not to remember the book. It's important to see the film as a film.

Memory is quite central for me. Part of it is that I like the actual texture of writing through memory.

You need to remember that. If you’re to have decent lives, you have to know who you are and what lies ahead of you, every one of you.