You Would Go Mad If You Began

Contemporary Britain Seems An Endlessly Fascinating Place To Me - But If I Knew A Little Bit More About Other Places, And Other Times, Maybe It Wouldn't.

Sometimes I Feel That I Am Destined Always To Be Offstage Whenever The Main Action Occurs. That God Has Made Me The Victim Of Some Cosmic Practical Joke, By Assigning Me Little More Than A Walk-on Part In My Own Life. Or Sometimes I Feel That My Role Is Simply To Be A Spectator To Other People's Stories, And Always To Wander Away At The Most Important Moment, Drifiting Into The Kitchen To Make A Cup Of Tea Just As The Denouement Unfolds.

The Plain Fact Is That She Never Really Liked Me, And Never Wanted Me. I Had Been A Mistake; And That, To Some Extent, Is What I Remain In My Own Eyes, To This Day. The Knowledge Never Goes, Can Never Be Undone. You Just Have To Find A Way To Live With It.

I'm One Of Those Unlucky People Who Had A Happy Childhood.

As The Books Grew Bigger And More Ambitious, The Situations In Question Sometimes Became Political Ones, And So It Became Necessary To Start Painting In The Social Background On A Scale Which Eventually Became Panoramic.