Geoff Dyer

I remember being interviewed about my first novel, 'The Colour of Memory.' They kept using the expression 'your first novel,' and I said, 'No, I object to that phrase, because this is it for me.' ”

Cheever constantly voiced doubts about his writing. Reading 'The Naked and the Dead' made him despair of his own 'confined talents.' ”

There are the tears of rage when books get praised when they're so obviously garbage. But then there are so many more that continue to move me: the end of 'Paradise Lost,' 'The Ruined Cottage' by Wordsworth, Prospero's 'Our revels now are ended' speech near the end of 'The Tempest.' ”

For me, a great joke is an idea expressed in extremely concentrated form. ”

I guess, when I left university, I liked the idea of being a writer, and I thought then that being a writer really meant that you were a novelist. But if one of the impulses for being a novelist is wanting to be a storyteller, I never had any urge to tell stories. ”

As soon as I hear that there's something to get used to, I know that I won't; I sort of pledge myself to not getting used to it. ”

The essence of my character is an inability to get used to things. This, in fact, is the one thing I have grown accustomed to: an inability to get used to things. ”

It doesn't require much thought for one to realise that any travel book worthy of the name has to be a departure from the standard idea of the form. ”

I love festivals, period. ”

Once you've published a few books, you drag around this ball and chain of a back list. All the evidence of how few you've sold is there. I think a lot of writers my age have this strange experience of going from would-be to has-been. ”