You may not know it but I'm no good at coping with all the attention in the luxury hotels I sometimes find myself in.

One of the pleasures of reading is seeing this alteration on the pages, and the way, by reading it, you have made the book yours.

The conversation, like many others I had with people on trains, derived an easy candour from the shared journey, the comfort of the dining car, and the certain knowledge that neither of us would see each other again.

And that is all anyone can do, try to be honest about what he feels, what he's seen or thinks he's seen.

Reading liberates you. You could know about the world through reading.

There is an intense but simple thrill in setting off in the morning on a mountain trail, knowing that everything you need is on your back. It is a confidence in having left the inessentials behind and of entering a world of natural beauty that has not been violated, where money has no value, and possessions are a dead weight. The person with the fewest possessions is the freest. Thoreau was right.

For years I felt that being respectable meant maintaining a sinister complacency, and the disreputable freedom I sought helped make me a writer.