I have learned things from the game. Much of my knowledge of locations in Britain and Europe comes not from school, but from away games or the sports pages, and hooliganism has given me both a taste for sociology and a degree of fieldwork experience. I have learned the value of investing time and emotion in things I cannot control, and of belonging to a community whose aspirations I share completely and uncritically.
Nick HornbyWe're here for such a short amount of time. Why do we spend any of it building sandcastles?
Nick HornbyYou're not allowed to say anything about books because they're books, and books are, you know, God.
Nick HornbyThe unhappiest people I know, romantically speaking, are the ones who like pop music the most; and I don't know whether pop music has caused this unhappiness, but I do know that they've been listening to the sad songs longer than they've been living the unhappy lives.
Nick HornbyI have always been accused of taking the things I love โ football, of course, but also books and records โ much too seriously, and I do feel a kind of anger when I hear a bad record, or when someone is lukewarm about a book that means a lot to me. Perhaps it was these desperate, bitter men in the West Stand at Arsenal who taught me how to get angry in this way; and perhaps it is why I earn some of my living as a critic โ maybe itโs those voices I can hear when I write. โYouโre a WANKER, X.โ โThe Booker Prize? THE BOOKER PRIZE? They should give that to me for having to read you.
Nick Hornby