Happiness Was Different In Childhood. It Was

I Have Never Really Got Used To Being On This Earth. Sometimes I Think Our Presence Here Is Due To A Cosmic Blunder, That We Were Meant For Another Planet Altogether, With Other Arrangements, And Other Laws, And Other, Grimmer Skies. I Try To Imagine It, Our True Place, Off On The Far Side Of The Galaxy, Whirling And Whirling. And The Ones Who Were Meant For Here, Are They Out There, Baffled And Homesick, Like Us? No, They Would Have Become Extinct Long Ago. How Could They Survive, These Gentle Earthlings, In A World That Was Made To Contain Us.

The Effect Of Prizes On One's Career - If That Is What To Call It - Is Considerable, Since They Give One More Clout With Publishers And More Notoriety Among Journalists. The Effect On One's Writing, However, Is Nil - Otherwise, One Would Be In Deep Trouble.

All I Wanted Was To Be Left Alone. They Abhor A Vacuum, Other People. You Find A Quiet Corner Where You Can Hunker Down In Peace, And The Next Minute There They Are, Crowding Around You In Their Party Hats, Tooting Their Paper Whistles In Your Face And Insisting You Get Up And Join In The Knees-up.

I Live In Dublin, God Knows Why. There Are Greatly More Congenial Places I Could Have Settled In - Italy, France, Manhattan - But I Like The Climate Here, And Irish Light Seems To Be Essential For Me And For My Writing.

Ian Mcewan Is A Very Good Writer; The First Half Of Atonement Alone Would Ensure Him A Lasting Place In English Letters.