"I read 'The Great Gatsby' in high school and was hypnotized by the beauty of the sentences and moved by the story about the irrevocability of lost love."

"I have actual dreams of Bruce Springsteen calling me up on stage to wear a bandanna and play rhythm guitar next to Little Steven."

"I've been a little bit obsessed with religion, without being a religious person, for about a decade."

"I don't really distinguish between sympathy and honesty when I'm writing. The two go together - I'm interested in inhabiting my characters, seeing the world through their eyes."

"Education, particularly higher education, will take Africa into the mainstream of globalization."

"I think the British people are very, very attached to the idea that the health service is free at the point of use. But there is no reason why every doctor, nurse and teacher in this country has to be employed by the state."

"The main part of intellectual education is not the acquisition of facts but learning how to make facts live."

"I'm a bit of a fraud, really, as I didn't study acting at a drama school."