Hari Kunzru

Some books I've kept because the binding is beautiful - I'm unlikely ever to read my grandmother's copy of 'The Life of Lord Nelson.' I'm addicted to secondhand bookshops. ”

I can see a version of my life where it all becomes meaningless. On a good day, writing seems noble. Other times, it's narcissistic and pointless. ”

Suburbia is all about private ownership and not having to share, and it leads to a paranoid, defensive mindset. I know this, having grown up in Essex. ”

I'm interested in complexity, in the mathematical sense, as well as the idiomatic sense. The idea of emergence - that it's possible for complex patterns to arise out of many simple interactions - is fascinating. ”

I enjoy thinking myself into other times and places. I don't like some of the conventions of the 'historical novel', but I think there's a way of doing it that has a lot of merit. ”

I'm fascinated by the emergence of a global class. They're highly mobile; they reject the idea of place. ”

There are things about our world that almost by their nature defy our ability to comprehend them. Some people use a religious register to deal with that - they call it God and that's a way of domesticating it. ”

In my early teens, science fiction and fantasy had an almost-total hold over my imagination. Their outcast status was part of their appeal. ”

Intellectuals who live in Hungary, or who wish to work or lecture there, are extremely circumspect in their criticism. ”

I think it's important for all culturally literate people to understand the technological substrate of new developments. ”