The Bfi Exists To Celebrate All Poets

The Feeling Of Not Belonging, Of Not Being Entirely Worthy, Of Being Sometimes Hostage To Your Own Sensibilities. Those Things Speak To Me Very Personally.

The Only Lesson To Extract From Any Civil War Is That It's Pointless And Futile And Ugly, And That There Is Nothing Glamorous Or Heroic About It. There Are Heroes, But The Causes Are Never Heroic.

I'm Interested In Stories Which Insist On A Dog Fails-to-eat-dog Kind Of World. I Hate Misanthropy, Want To Believe That There's A Possibility That We Might All Be Redeemed, That Hope Deferred Makes The Soul Sick, That Our Humanity Is Fragile, Funny, Common, Crazy, Full Of The Longing For Love, The Failure Of Love.

You Know, You Lose A Lot Of Social Skills If You’re A Writer. You Spend Too Long Alone. And It’s Forced Me To Address That.

When I Became The Chair Of The British Film Institute, I Didn't Understand How Much Of My Time Would Be Taken Up With Trying To Make A Case For The British Film Institute: What It's For, Why It Exists, Why It Needs Its Money.