It Is Living, Not Thinking, As A

To Become A Mother Is To Learn A Whole Language - To Relearn It, Perhaps, As It Was The Tongue To Which We Were Born - And Hence Gain Entrance To A Forgotten World Of Comprehension.

I'm A Novelist, Not A Social Scientist Or A Commentator.

For Me, A Novel Is Always The Result Of My Attempt To Impose Myself On Raw Circumstances. It Is A Concrete Form Of Lived Experience.

The Distinctive Feature Of My Family Was Intolerance Of Sensitivity And Emotion - Everything's Great, It All Has To Be Great All The Time And Why Do You Have To Spoil It? Whereas Probably The Most Fundamental And Important Thing To Me Has Been Defending My Right To Tell The Truth About How I Feel.

Society In The English Countryside Is Still Strangely, Quaintly Divided. If Black Comedy And A Certain Type Of Social Commentary Are What You Want, I Think English Rural Communities Offer Quite A Lot Of Material.