And now the moment. Such a moment has a peculiar character. It is brief and temporal indeed, like every moment; it is transient as all moments are; it is past, like every moment in the next moment. And yet it is decisive, and filled with the eternal. Such a moment ought to have a distinctive name; let us call it the Fullness of Time.

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.

This is what divorce is: taking things you no longer want from people you no longer love.

When I was young, I was very technical about these things. I didn't like to admit to any intimate relation with what I was writing.

This is what a woman is: unadorned, after children and work and age, and experience-these are the marks of living.

Desperation, weakness, vulnerability - these things will always be exploited. You need to protect the weak, ring-fence them, with something far stronger than empathy.

He did not consider if or how or why he loved them. They were just love: they were the first evidence he ever had of love, and they would be the last confirmation of love when everything else fell away.