I Would Hate To Live In The

Ten Thousand Pounds Is The Legal Value Of A Negligently Taken Life, Of A Child Or A Parent. A Cold And Somewhat Mean-spirited Calculation: You Would Do Better If You Slipped On A Paving-stone And Broke A Front Tooth.

I Hope In My Books I Help Children To See Their Strengths, And Show Them I Have Some Idea Of What They May Occasionally Be Going Through. Especially At Tricky Moments When It Is Easier To Go Back And Evade Things Rather Than Go Forwards And Confront Them.

I Was Cleaning Out The Pigsty At A Farm In Wales, Where My Mother Had Rented A Room, When The Results Of My Final School Exam Were Handed To Me By The Postman, Along With The News That I Had A State Scholarship To Oxford. I Had Waited For This Letter For So Many Weeks That I Had Abandoned Hope, Deciding That I Had Failed Ignominiously.

I Like Stirring The Pot - I Think It's Part Of My Duty, To Shake People Up A Bit - Make Them Look At Things In A Different Way.

I Met Richard Burton, An Raf Cadet On A Two-term Course. I Would Have Flirted More Enthusiastically If It Had Not Been For The Horrid Boils On The Back Of His Neck.