I am the man who comes and goes between the bar and the telephone booth. Or, rather:that man is called ‘I’ and you know nothing else about him, just as this station is called only...

We can identify with Frodo and Sam, setting off not knowing quite where they are going and what they are to do.

To create, I destroyed myself; I made myself external to such a degree within myself that within myself I do not exist except in an external fashion. I am the living setting in which several...

I don’t regret setting bombs.

Bicycles, bullock carts, and buses that belched thick, black smoke moved in anarchic streams with the auto rickshaws and cars along the streets. Many of the shops—normally selling everything from groceries to stainless steel cookware...

If you set a clear standard for yourself; for how you wish to be treated — people take note.

The house smelled musty and damp, and a little sweet, as if it were haunted by the ghosts of long-dead cookies.

The sun kept dipping down into the ocean and the lights came on at the harbor, casting sudden shadows on the ground, illuminating the faces that were just a second ago silhouettes. The sky was...

He must shape simultaneously (in an expanding creative moment) his characters, plot, and setting, each inextricably connected to the others; he must make his whole world in a single, coherent gesture, as a potter makes...

The moon went slowly down in loveliness; she departed into the depth of the horizon, and long veil-like shadows crept up the sky through which the stars appeared. Soon, however, they too began to pale...

On the whole I try to keep Modesty and Willie in timeless settings, which is why I avoid all the latest slang and in-words. It won’t be long before ‘brill’ sounds as dated as ‘super’...

People laughed at me for setting up a surf shop.

In the detective story, as in its mirror image, the Quest for the Grail, maps (the ritual of space) and timetables (the ritual of time) are desirable. Nature should reflect its human inhabitants, i.e., it...

Great gains come from setting one’s brains into the right frames of thinking

Since its sudden birth the city had expanded, swallowing up acre upon acre of the surrounding grasslands and drawing thousands into its domain. Hardly built on the most advantageous ground, miles from the open waters,...

The color of the sky was like a length of white chalk turned on its side and rubbed into asphalt. Sanded–that was how the world looked, worked slowly down to no rough edges.

All brightness was gone, leaving nothing. We stepped out of the tent onto nothing. Sledge and tent were there, Estraven stood beside me, but neither he nor I cast any shadow. There was dull light...

Your flour is your dream and your bread is your fulfillment. The environment in which your flour is baked can influence the shape of your bread… Just take it as simple as that!

An author knows his landscape best; he can stand around, smell the wind, get a feel for his place.

It is not only the viability and variety of the seed that makes the harvest look plumpy. Sometimes, the soil must value the value of the seed. When the soil is not supportive, the seed’s...

For me, writing stories set, well, wherever they’re best set, is a form of cultural curiosity that is uniquely Scottish – we’re famous for travelling in search of adventure.