I'm not really good at fun-to-know, human interest stuff. We're not 'celebrities', whose life itself is a performance. Good or bad or ugly, we are our words. They're what people meet.

It's a guilty secret of a lot of writers, as you get older you don't read as much fiction as you used to, mainly because it's like you are deconstructing it all the time.

I'm interested in mythology generally, but India has no special place in my heart - although Hindu gods seem a lot more fun.

(About a cookbook...) - What about this one? Maids of Honor? - Weeelll, they starts OUT as Maids of Honor...but they ends up Tarts.

Everything is a test.

They may have been ugly. They may have been evil. But when it came to poetry in motion, the Things had all the grace and coordination of a deck-chair.

I don't want to hurt you, Mistress Weatherwax," said Mrs Gogol. "That's good," said Granny. "I don't want you to hurt me either.