It implies a slight failure as a writer that you are reduced to being a ghostwriter for the money.

Storytelling has a narcotic power.

Humans have changed little over time. We think we've invented the modern world but they were making better speeches 2,000 years ago and grappling with issues of empire and terrorism.

But only a fool sails into combat with nature

Everyone thinks politics will just go on the way it is. I don't agree.

In a way I'm almost more rueful about the notion of having a non-ideological Labour party than I am about the personality of Tony Blair.

By dawn he had surrendered, gratefully, to the old inertia, the product of always seeing both sides of every question.