I Think I'm Less The Writer Than

A Man Is Not Much If He Can't Depend On Himself, And Nothing If Others Can't Depend On Him.

Happiness Was Different In Childhood. It Was So Much Then A Matter Simply Of Accumulation, Of Taking Things - New Experiences, New Emotions - And Applying Them Like So Many Polished Tiles To What Would Someday Be The Marvellously Finished Pavilion Of The Self.

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.

The World Is Not Real For Me Until It Has Been Pushed Through The Mesh Of Language.

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.