Mary Wesley

That image of the countryside being a threatening place still exists. People continue to resist the challenge of learning about aspects of life they don't understand.

We're all like children. We may think we grow up, but to me, being grown up is death, stopping thinking, trying to find out things, going on learning.

We all lie to each other, present some sort of front.

I have a garden, and I'm passionately interested in young people.

People try much less hard to make a marriage work than they used to fifty years ago. Divorce is easier.

Unimaginative people are spared quite a lot. They're often much happier, because they don't go through all the variety of conceptions of the person they love.

My father was a soldier and my mother was a great mover. She once counted up how many places she had lived in during the first 25 years of her marriage and it came to 20.

Imagination which comes into play in falling in love is different from any other. Certainly in my case, and I've fallen in love all my life, one imagines the person to be as you want them to be. They frequently turn out to be someone different, for better or worse.

Each marriage has to be judged separately, and we never know what's going on in another person's marriage.

Writing Part of the Scenery has been a very different experience. I have been reminded of people and events, real and imaginary which have been part of my life. This book is a celebration of the land which means so much to me.

Twenty years ago, I was living in a lovely cottage on the edge of Dartmoor but I couldn't afford to run a car.

Of course risk-taking does not always pay off, but it's a lot of fun!