And now it seems she's on my wavelength. That's all I need. My mind isn't much of a comfort to me but at least I thought it was private.

Sometimes I think that the biggest difference between men and women is that more men need to seek out some terrible lurking thing in existence and hurl themselves upon it. Women know where it lives but they can let it alone.

When I write a book, I don't have a plan or an outline. The characters move the action, and the action develops the characters. When I write a book, I become an actor, really, taking the role of the person who is speaking or acting at the time, and so their reactions to whatever they see are my reactions.

Is there an existence that is only mine?

Usually my starting point is something that I've seen. It might be a painting, it might be an object. But they always start from a definite sensory experience.

When you suffer an attack of nerves you're being attacked by the nervous system. What chance has a man got against a system?.

Who is Alice?" asked mother. "Alice is somebody that nobody can see," said Frances. "And that is why she does not have a birthday. So I am singing Happy Thursday to her." - Frances the badger