“You need to remember that. If you’re to have decent lives, you have to know who you are and what lies ahead of you, every one of you.”

It had never occurred to me that our lives, which had been so closely interwoven, could unravel with such speed.

All children have to be deceived if they are to grow up without trauma.

People were incredibly kind to our family and went out of their way to help.

Because maybe, in a way, we didn’t leave it behind nearly as much as we might once have thought. Because somewhere underneath, a part of us stayed like that: fearful of the world around us, and no matter how much we despised ourselves for it–unable quite to let each other go.

After all, what can we ever gain in forever looking back and blaming ourselves if our lives have not turned out quite as we might have wished?

Typically in my novels the narrator tells a story by remembering, and the memories are colored by this and colored by that. So the whole universe of the novel tends to be framed by the narrator’s memories and thoughts.

As a writer, I’m more interested in what people tell themselves happened rather than what actually happened.

There is certainly a satisfaction and dignity to be gained in coming to terms with the mistakes one has made in the course of one’s life.

I think it’s quite difficult to understand what kind of life a writer leads. They might be millionaires, or they might be starving people.

What I’m not sure about, is if our lives have been so different from the lives of the people we save. We all complete. Maybe none of us really understand what we’ve lived through, or feel we’ve had enough time.

As I say, I have never in all these years thought of the matter in quite this way; but then it is perhaps in the nature of coming away on a trip such as this that one is prompted towards such surprising new perspectives on topics one imagined one had long ago thought throughly.

An artist’s concern is to capture beauty wherever he finds it.

When you become a parent, or a teacher, you turn into a manager of this whole system. You become the person controlling the bubble of innocence around a child, regulating it.

The Booker triumph of Graham Swift’s moving, effortlessly profound Last Orders is a vindication of the quiet, much-misunderstood path this fine writer chose to take after the brilliance of Waterland more than ten years ago.

The world is crawling with authors touring now. They’re like performance artists.

You say you’re sure? Sure that you’re in love? How can you know it? You think love is so simple?

Don’t let perfection hold you back from living the life of your dreams.

People die but legends live forever.

Living up to an image that you have of yourself or that other people have of you is inauthentic living.

I feel that my environment reflects my belief in the grace and art and elegance of living simply.

Sadness is great, the parting is a pain, yet in this pain lives the promise of reunion.

So pleasurable to live for yourself, not for others.

My mother taught me that no matter how you earn a living, whether you’re a caregiver or truck driver, grocery store clerk or small business owner, every job has inherent value and worth.

When we treat children’s play as seriously as it deserves, we are helping them feel the joy that’s to be found in the creative spirit. It’s the things we play with and the people who help us play that make a great difference in our lives.