Suicide is the most private and mysterious of acts, inexplicable because the chief actor is never there to explain it.

For me, the dead remain dead. If I couldn't believe that, I don't think I could go on living.

I don't think writers choose the genre, the genre chooses us. I wrote out of the wish to create order out of disorder, the liking of a pattern.

Charm is always genuine; it may be superficial but it isn't false.

I still occasionally need to struggle but I now fear it less. The weapons I fight it with are also my consolations: books, music, food, wine, nature.

There are two options for any society: total prohibition as in a totalitarian state, or total license. Both avoid the ardours of decision. Both have the attraction of certainty. The difficult option is to decide where the line should be drawn and this, surely, is the responsiblity of any civilized and democratic country.

Publishers don't nurse you; they buy and sell you.