It seems to me now that the deep structures [in writing] are often subconscious and set in childhood.

When I was 21 I wanted to write like Kafka. But, unfortunately for me, I wrote like a script editor for The Simpsons who'd briefly joined a religious cult and then discovered Foucault. Such is life.

When I was 13, I really used to skip down the street, happy in thinking, "Oh, well, someone's suffering pain in order for me to feel this pleasure."

I don't keep any copies of my books in the house - they go to my mum's flat. I don't like them around.

You can feel bad... I mean, that's not illegal.

Make sure the lubricant is unscented. Don't join fashionable 'schools of thought.' Read everything.

A lot of women, when they're young, feel they have very good friends, and find later on that friendship is complicated. It's easy to be friends when everyone's 18. It gets harder the older you get, as you make different life choices, as people say in America. A lot of women's friendships begin to founder.