The current publishing scene is extremely good for the big, popular books. They sell them brilliantly, market them and all that. It is not good for the little books. And really valuable books have been allowed to go out of print. In the old days, the publishers knew that these difficult books, the books that appeal only to a minority, were very productive in the long run. Because they're probably the books that will be read in the next generation. It's heart-breaking how often I have to say when I'm giving talks, 'This book is out of print. This book is out of print.' It's a roll call of dead books.

All political movements are like this - we are in the right, everyone else is in the wrong. The people on our own side who disagree with us are heretics, and t…

Some people obtain fame, others deserve it.

I'm always astounded at the way we automatically look at what divides and separates us. We never look at what people have in common. If you see it, black and w…

In old days books were written by men of letters and read by the public. Nowadays books are written by the public and read by nobody.

If we can't stamp out literature in the country, we can at least stop its being brought in from outside.

Libraries are brothels for the mind. Which means that librarians are the madames, greeting the punters, understanding their strange tastes and needs and then p…