The dictate of the light says: Know yourself and what you are. The dark replies, By all means, but then become afraid.

I just love writing. It's magical, it's somewhere else to go, it's somewhere much more dreadful, somewhere much more exciting. Somewhere I feel I belong, possibly more than in the so-called real world.

Your dreams will betray you. Go nowhere on a horse that fades.

There was no violence, no speed. It moved to the rhythm of an elder dance, putting all the rituals of the world to shame. Black, silver, gold and moon-opal, night and sea, fire, earth, air and water.

As a child, my mother told me lots of fairy stories, many her own invention. She, too, tended to reverse the norm.

I've been criticised for writing in too complex a manner for younger people.

The other writer who had a very important early influence on me when I was about 17 was C.S. Lewis.