Because I've always felt, whether the fatwa or whatever, the writer's great weapon is the truth and integrity of his voice. And as long as what you're saying is what you truly, honestly believe to be the case, then whatever the consequences, that's fine. That's an honorable position.

He had picked up languages the way most sailors pick up diseases; languages were his gonorrhoea, his syphilis, his scurvy, his ague, his plague.

Two things form the bedrock of any open society - freedom of expression and rule of law. If you don't have those things, you don't have a free country.

Home has become such a scattered, damaged, various concept in our present travails. There is so much to yearn for. There are so few rainbows any more.

Language upon a silvered tongue affords enchantment enough.

If you want to draw people into the story, you really have to write as if you're writing a novel and make these actually-existing people, including the actually-existing person with my name, into a believable person on the page. And that requires distance. That requires not being right up against the events you're talking about.

You can't assume if you do something contentious that people will be on your side. The moment violence enters the story, the story changes. Then the question is, "How do you face up to violence?" And then you have to have a no-compromise position. And this is quite simply a lesson we learn in the school playground.