Somebody said that writers are like otters... Otters, if they do a trick and you give them a fish, the next time they'll do a better trick or a different trick because they'd already done that one. And writers tend to be otters. Most of us get pretty bored doing the same trick. We've done it, so let's do something different.

I'm never quite sure if I'm me when I'm dressed up.

Life - and I don't suppose I'm the first to make this comparison - is a disease: sexually transmitted, and invariably fatal.

For love is no part of the dreamworld. Love belongs to Desire, and Desire is always cruel.

He had had a severe shock some weeks earlier, when, having narrowly failed to capture a large grey-brown hare for his dinner, it had stopped at the edge of the forest, looked at him with disdain, and said, 'Well, I hope you're proud of yourself, that's all,' and had scampered off into the long grass

You can't just boss bacteria around like that," said the younger Mrs. Hempstock. "They don't like it." "Stuff and silliness," said the old lady. "You leave wigglers alone and they'll be carrying on like anything. Show them who's boss and they can't do enough for you. You've tasted my cheese.

Do you know why I stopped being Delight, my brother? I do. There are things not in your book. There are paths outside this garden.