I like to believe that if you pay close attention to the sentences as they unfold, they will draw you in rather than pushing you away.

Writing is very good for household tasks. Because you'd rather fix a dripping tap or paint an old wall - you'd rather do almost anything than sit and write. I have to reach a point of obsession in order to write, and so I find starting a book incredibly difficult.

Writing is not like acting, where you can pull these little stunts that create a particular effect. Words are all it is about, and the way you use words has to be individual and particular to you.

I think the impulse took shape in early childhood when I was very ill with lymphoma for a number of years. I spent a lot of time in hospitals and sick-rooms, being read to by various relatives, and I learned to associate books with love and attention.

'Arctic Summer,' as you might know, is the title of Forster's one unfinished novel.

India I have visited a great many times, though there is a lot about it I will never understand.