Closure is a greasy little word which, moreover, describes a nonexistent condition. The truth, Venus, is that nobody gets over anything.

I think all writers have a bit of genius in them, and a bit of talent. Genius retreats but talent improves.

The first thing that distinguishes a writer is that he is most alive when alone.

Belief is otiose; reality is sufficiently awesome as it stands.

Kingsley Amis was a lenient father. His paternal style, in the early years, can best be described as amiably minimalist - in other words, my mother did it all.

That certain snobbery of certainly the Parisian - combined with a complete denial of your historical legacy, is just awful. That's a funny thing about France. Saul Bellow wrote somewhere that he saw right through the French. He lived there. He wrote The Adventures of Augie March in Paris, and there's no one better than him to say what's unbearable about the French.

I would never write about someone that forced me to write at a lower register than what I can write.