There's no reason why you can't deliver a grammar-school curriculum to an all-ability intake.

I think that magazines like Vanity Fair are still operating under the old rules, and that if you come to work for a magazine like Vanity Fair, even today, you're certainly expected to treat people like Peggy Siegal very deferentially.

I've never been to a shrink. But my parents were very psychologically literate - my father had undergone Freudian analysis - and we often talked about other people in psychological terms, so I picked up a lot of that.

I don't envy young Brits crossing the Atlantic to make their fortunes today.

In Britain, by contrast, we still think that class plays a part in determining a person's life chances, so we're less inclined to celebrate success and less inclined to condemn failure. The upshot is that it's much easier to be a failure in Britain than it is in America.

The moment I'm perceived to be even a tiny bit successful, my career will go down the pan.

I've become a professional failure - in order to pay the mortgage I have to remain unemployed. Luckily, a disaster always seems to befall me at exactly the right moment.