I never read articles about my books.

For me, photography only stopped because I was selling books.

If I'm researching something strange and rococo, I'll go to the London Library or the British Library and look it up in books.

I read the papers online, and something usually piques my curiosity - that will then be the baseline of my research for the day.

I spend a lot of time looking at rococo books. And almanacs used to be huge sellers - they were pretty much part of the fabric of life. I thought, this is bizarre, I'd love to buy a book like this, and there isn't one. So I thought, all right then, this could be fun. I'll write an almanac.

The idea that I am cynical because I'm writing the books that I write is a bit like someone saying, 'What, you've done a second album? Oh, I see, cashing in on your first album, are you?' But I'm a musician! It's sort of what I do.