What are we? Humans? Or animals? Or savages?

Life's scientific, but we don't know, do we? Not certainly, I mean.

I have a confession to make. The love affair of my life has been with the Greek language. I have now reached the age when it has occurred to me that I may have read some books for the last time. I suddenly thought that there are books I cannot bear not to read again before I die. One that stands out a mile is Homer's Iliad.

The Navy's a very gentlemanly business. You fire at the horizon to sink a ship and then you pull people out of the water and say, 'Frightfully sorry, old chap.'

Every novel is a biography. Well, then, this is a novel [The Paper Men] which is a biography that is pretending to be an autobiography. That's what you could say about it.

For a small island, the place is remarkably diverse. Writers tend to see things from their own points of view, looking in one direction very much.

As far as the novel is concerned in my own country, I think it's in a pretty healthy state.