I found English to be a sort of Thomas Hardy aversion therapy.

Put one word after another. Find the right word, put it down.

I imagine the world dividing into the people who want to feed their children, and the ones shooting at them.

When I was young I was a fool. So wrap me up in dreams and death.

Fiction gives us empathy: it puts us inside the minds of other people, gives us the gifts of seeing the world through their eyes. Fiction is a lie that tells us true things, over and over.

My very small part in WATCHMEN is that, every now and then, Alan would phone me: ''Neil, you're an educated man. Where does it say...'' He would need a quote from the Bible, or an essay about owls. I was his occasional research assistant.

Sister Mary chose that moment to come in with the tea. Satanist or not, she'd also found a plate and arranged some iced biscuits on it.