I've come to realize that most good ideas are precisely the ones you can't describe.

I think I've learnt that there is no character so strange that you haven't shared their experience in some small way.

People say that you always have to tell the truth. But they do not mean this because you are not allowed to tell old people that they are old and you are not allowed to tell people if they smell funny or if a grown-up has made a fart. And you are not allowed to say, 'I don't like you,' unless that person has been horrible to you.

I suffer depression only in the sense that I am a writer. We don't have proper jobs to go to. We are on our own all day. Show me a writer who doesn't get depressed: who has a completely stable mood. They'd be a garage mechanic or something.

And what he meant was that maths wasn't like life because in life there are no straightforward answers in the end

... why I like timetables, because they make sure I don't get lost in time.

Usually people look at you when they're talking to you. I know that they're working out what I'm thinking, but I can't tell what they're thinking. It is like being in a room with a one-way mirror in a spy film.