That tertiary education is under a sustained assault by a political and - it often seems - social consensus that equates all education with training for increased productivity, only makes academe a still more promising environment for a contrarian.

A creative life cannot be sustained by approval, any more than it can be destroyed by criticism.

Is there anything more useless than a crouton? I sometimes wake up in the small hours with a start and realise that what's roused me is an overpowering urge to visit violence on its originator.

People tend to think of their lives as having a dramatic arc, because they read too much fiction.

Without a shadow of doubt, Trafalgar Square has to be one of the most crap urban public spaces in the world.

I think the fundamental apprehension is that the city's an organism of some form, rather than being governed from above.

I have a healthy appetite for solitude. If you don't, you have no business being a writer.