You have the older generation like Iris Murdoch and Angus Wilson who are not as old as Graham Greene, but still are coming on. I dare say anyone who knew the scene better than I know it could fill it in with a very satisfactory supply of novels.

And I've been wearing specs since I was three.

Ralph wept for the end of innocence, the darkness of man's heart, and the fall through the air of the true, wise friend called Piggy.

I mean, if we're concerned genuinely with writing, I think we probably get on with our work. I think this is very true of English writers, but perhaps not so true of French writers, who seem to read each other passionately, extensively, and endlessly, and who then talk about it to each other - which is splendid.

Don't get me wrong. I have nothing against this as a method, but it is not what English writers do.

Sleep is when all the unsorted stuff comes flying out as from a dustbin upset in a high wind.

Maybe there is a beast… maybe it's only us.