Africa has no future.

I read a piece of writing and within a paragraph or two I know whether it is by a woman or not.

I really wasn't equipped to be a writer when I left Oxford. But then I set out to learn. I've always had the highest regard for the craft. I've always felt it was work.

If you write a novel alone you sit and you weave a little narrative. And it's O.K., but it's of no account.

Small things start us in new ways of thinking

That element of surprise is what I look for when I am writing. It is my way of judging what I am doing - which is never an easy thing to do.

The ancillary aspect of every British city now is the council estate.