Caress the detail, the divine detail.

Knowing you have something good to read before bed is among the most pleasurable of sensations.

And the rest is rust and stardust.

Do not be angry with the rain; it simply does not know how to fall upwards.

Mind you, sometimes the angels smoke, hiding it with their sleeves, and when the archangel comes, they throw the cigarettes away: that’s when you get shooting stars.

Curiosity is insubordination in its purest form.

Lolita, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.

The writer's job is to get the main character up a tree, and then once they are up there, throw rocks at them.

There are aphorisms that, like airplanes, stay up only while they are in motion.

I think it is all a matter of love: the more you love a memory, the stronger and stranger it is.

Loneliness as a situation can be corrected, but as a state of mind it is an incurable illness.

A lot of my nonfiction is very strong environmental stories - I was the first guy to write about the dolphin killings in Japan.

Even if you're only wearing trainers and a vest, eyeliner will instantly transform you. People always look put-together when their make-up's on and their eyes are popping - just ask Amy Winehouse!

Loud wind, strong wind, sweeping o'er the mountains, Fresh wind, free wind, blowing from the sea, Pour forth thy vials like streams from airy mountains, Draughts of life to me.

Most questions are clear when someone else has to decide them.

Paranoia, the destroyer.

Oh, whoever has been himself alone can never find another’s loneliness strange.

Take my camel, dear,' said my aunt Dot, climbing down from that animal on her return from high Mass.

What good to us is a long life if it is difficult and barren of joys, and if it is so full of misery that we can only welcome death as a deliverer?

You get one life. And if you make the mistake of choosing a profession that doesn't enrich anybody but you, you wont even live that one

I will but confess the sins of my green cloak to my grey friar's frock, and all shall be well again.