If you are a writer you're at home, which means you're out of touch. You have to make excuses to get out there and look at how the world is changing.

To claim that music is more important than oxygen would be trite and sentimental. It would also be true.

If you're from Dublin, for example, chances are you live with your family, if you're lucky enough to, right up to the mid-20s. And most of the people I know, when they finally sort of set off on their own, they don't stray all that far.

I don't work to any commissions. I do what I want to do.

The Irish are the niggers of Europe, lads.

No matter how close to personal experience a story might be, inevitably you are going to get to a part that isn't yours and, actually, whether it happened or not becomes irrelevant. It is all about choosing the right words.

When you grow up on an island, what matters is how you stand to the sea.