I am religious in the sense that I believe in God and I believe that there is an abiding logical spirit that controls what goes on to a certain extent.

The act of writing itself is done in secret, like masturbation.

In spite of the problems he was having he was going on with his life. There are thousands who don’t or won’t or can’t and plenty of them aren’t in prison either.

People think that I must be a very strange person. This is not correct. I have the heart of a small boy. It is in a glass jar on my desk.

Only two things happen to writers when they die: Either their work survives, or it becomes forgotten.

The first draft of a book—even a long one—should take no more than three months, the length of a season.

Things were going very fast now. Too fast to suit him. Fantasy and reality had merged.