Children like being a little scared, but they don't want to be disturbed.

What I've always tried to find in my books are points at which the private lives of the characters, and also my own, intersect with the public life of the culture.

The great concern is that year after year, rising numbers of journalists are being killed in pursuit of their work. They are increasingly seen as not being neutral but rather as combatants by one side or the other.

In the movies, the writer is just the servant, the employee.

In the experience of art, time seems not to exist. When I'm writing and think, "I've been working for two hours," I've actually been working for seven.

Between the adored and the adorer falls the shadow.

Exile is a dream of a glorious return. Exile is a vision of revolution: Elba, not St Helena. It is an endless paradox: looking forward by always looking back. The exile is a ball hurled high into the air.