At 20, 25, 30, we begin to realise that the possibilities of escape are getting fewer. We have jobs, children, partners, debts. This is the part of us to which literary fiction speaks.

What I love about the theatre is that it's always metaphorical. It's like going back to being a kid again, and we're all pretending in a room. Sometimes, when the pretending really works, I find it much, much more moving than something on film.

I thought Bill Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything was remarkable. Managing to be entertaining while still delivering all that hard science was a pretty good trick to pull off.

..because when we look up into the sky at night there will be no darkness, just the blazing light of billions and billions of stars, all falling.

The secret of contentment lay in ignoring many things completely.

I want my name to mean me.

Most of my work consisted of crossing out. Crossing out was the secret of all good writing.