The greatest ideas are the simplest.

One thing should be put firmly. Where people have commented on that novel [The Paper Men], they generally criticize the poor academic, Rick L. Tucker, who is savaged by the author, Wilfred Barclay. I don't think people have noticed that I have been far ruder about Barclay than I have been about Tucker. Tucker is a fool, but Barclay is a swine. The author really gets his come-uppance.

Heaven lies around us in our infancy.

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'm not a critic so much of my own writing. People must make up their own minds over that.

I've come across a novel called The Palm-Wine Drinkard, by the Nigerian writer Amos Tutuola, that is really remarkable because it is a kind of fantasy of West African mythology all told in West African English which, of course, is not the same as standard English.

I suppose I'd have to say that my favourite author is Homer. After Homer's Ilaid, I'd name The Odyssey, and then I'd mention a number of plays of Euripides.