A terrible thing about getting oldish is that your friends start dying, and in the last ten years I have lost seven or eight of my closest.

When I was asked to be Writer in Residence at Edinburgh I thought, you can't teach poetry. This is ridiculous.

And it's impossible for me to read Henry James.

I used to fish the Border rivers, but nowadays you have to queue up for a shot and I can't stand that.

When I go fishing I like to know that there's nobody within five miles of me.

And the second question, can poetry be taught? I didn't think so.

I don't think of myself all the time.