I was at the tail end of the family. The next brother along was already seven years older than me. I remember growing up by myself, playing games by myself.

Happy is what you realize you are a fraction of a second before it's too late.

Every great narrative is at least two narratives, if not more - the thing that is on the surface and then the things underneath which are invisible.

Books mean all possibilities. They mean moving out of yourself, losing yourself, dying of thirst and living to your full. They mean everything.

I wouldn't call my work Modernist. I would rust if I try to think about labels. I'd feel like the Tin Man in 'The Wizard of Oz.

To be known so well by someone is an unimaginable gift. But to be imagined so well by someone is even better.

Oh. To be filled with goodness then shattered by goodness, so beautifully mosaically fragmented by such shocking goodness.

Stella Duffy is a writer who never lets you down.

Do you come to art to be comforted, or do you come to art to be re-skinned?

We'd never expect to understand a piece of music on one listen, but we tend to believe we've read a book after reading it just once.

Short stories consume you faster. They're connected to brevity. With the short story, you are up against mortality. I know how tough they are as a form, but they're also a total joy.

A town without a book shop was a town without a heart

True leaders are ready to sweat when making rehearsal, than to cry tears when actually practicing. To save the tears, be ready to sweat!

My dearly beloved if I am to die today and never see the sweet face of you I want you to know that I am no great man and am lucky to have such a woman as you.

I be more hipper than a hippopotamus Get off in your head like a neurologist

I believe in the impossible because no one else does.

Give beauty back, beauty, beauty, beauty, back to God, beauty's self and beauty's giver.

Sometimes you want to use the music in a clarity way to explain something in the film.

Everything may be expressed with almost nothing at all

Every ballet, whether or not successful artistically or with the public, has given me something important.

Hard work will get you a professorship or a BMW. You need both work and luck for a Booker, a Nobel or a private jet.