No man writes a book without meaning something, though he may not have the faculty of writing consequentially and expressing his meaning.
I wrote The Same Sea not as a political allegory about Israelis and Palestinians. I wrote it about something much more gutsy and immediate. I wrote it as a piece of chamber music.
I do not mean for one second to suggest that 'White Doves at Morning' was written with a movie deal in mind. Certainly not.
Writers are given one great story to tell their story. I’m telling my story as a political document.
I write with a sort of grim determination to deal with things that are hidden and difficult, and this means, I think, that pleasure is out of the question. I would associate this with narcissism anyway, and I would disapprove of it.
I never wrote my books especially for children.
Write to amuse? What an appalling suggestion! I write to make people anxious and miserable and to worsen their indigestion.
When I started out as a novelist, I thought I was going to be a private-eye writer. That was my intent, and that's what I studied, I mean, scholarly.
A happy ending was imperative. I shouldn't have bothered to write otherwise. I was determined that in fiction anyway two men should fall in love and remain in it for the ever and ever that fiction allows, and in this sense, Maurice and Alec still roam the greenwood.
To me, there's no point in writing merely to entertain.
I wrote 'Tom Sawyer' and 'Huck Finn' for adults exclusively, and it always distressed me when I find that boys and girls have been allowed access to them. The mind that becomes soiled in youth can never again be washed clean.
I would not be interested in writing if I didn't feel that what I wrote was an act of good citizenship or an attempt, at any rate, to be a good citizen.
You know, gynecology has a role; sex is a gift. And literature is not about sending messages.
From the very beginning, I had an ambition for 'The Luminaries': a direction - but not a real idea.
