I was always influenced by language.

Reread, rewrite, reread, rewrite. If it still doesn’t work, throw it away.

A problem with a piece of writing often clarifies itself if you go for a long walk.

Finish the day's writing when you still want to continue.

The human longing for story is so powerful, so primitive, that it seems like something not learned, but locked into our genes.

i wish i was away in Ingo far across the briny sea sailing over deepest waters where neither care nore worry trouble me

I enjoy research; in fact research is so engaging that it would be easy to go on for years, and never write the novel at all.

It is a violation which has obsessed the tyrants of the twentieth century. They do not want simply to kill their opponents, but to liquidate them, to deny that they have ever existed.

However, the difficulties and pleasures of the writing itself are similar for a novel with a historical setting and a novel with a contemporary setting, as far as I'm concerned.

However, I began to submit poems to British magazines, and some were accepted. It was a great moment to see my first poems published. It felt like entering a tradition.

Writing poetry makes you intensely conscious of how words sound, both aloud and inside the head of the reader. You learn the weight of words and how they sound to the ear.

You have to discover how best you can manage your time to carry out your work effectively

Death is most terrifying to those who have yet to live.

Evil is only good perverted.

United, there is little we cannot do in a host of cooperative ventures. Divided, there is little we can do-for we dare not meet a powerful challenge at odds and split asunder.

We run things, things don't run we.

I went through a lot of abuse and a lot of really difficult things growing up - depression, anxiety, attempted suicide.

Day by day, tiny specks of us float away.

I do know that there isn't ever going to be a time when there aren't any knitters.

I have taken a pill to kill The thin Papery feeling.

Of all the things I love to taste, sweetest is the kiss of love.