Geoff Dyer

I really have to give the Navy all the credit it deserves. They were so flexible and accommodating, given that everybody on board had better things to worry about than this person coming on board who's just going to be in the way, really. ”

I was studying English, as you will, in the day, and five nights a week, I would be at the cinema. That continued throughout my 20s, which was also the 1980s - there was a lot of really good films coming out then. ”

One of the great privileges of my life was growing up in a house without books. ”

I am still moved by passages of Marx: the 'Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right,' for example, where, after the famous line about religion being 'the opium of the people,' he goes on to call it 'the heart of a heartless world.' ”

The person doing the learning is the person writing the book as much as the person reading it. ”

My evangelical phase about Burning Man is well and truly in the past. ”

I've seen 'Stalker' more times than any film except 'The Great Escape.' ”

Writing, for me, has always been a way of not having a career. ”

Now, instead of loading up your jalopy and heading for California, you take a second, badly paid job; 'The Grapes of Wrath' has turned into 'Nickel and Dimed.' ”

In terms of target audience, who cares what a middle-aged guy like me wants; most mainstream are not catering to me at all. ”