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" I think it's quite normal for people to have love affairs. "

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" I didn't start writing my own books until I was 40. "

" 'Philomena' was even better than I had expected. I was so pleased to see the evil Irish nuns thoroughly exposed, and I thought Judi Dench gave a flawless performance, as did everybody else. "

" Dickens belongs to the English people. "

" It's a difficult thing to lose a child, a grown-up child. "

" I would like to have a more social life than I have. "

" Today's children have very short attention spans because they are being reared on dreadful television programmes which are flickering away in the corner. "

" I enjoyed the whole process of learning and was always happy when autumn came and school or college started up again. "

" My life was a sort of series of random disasters. "

" Writers often feel obliged to adopt some sort of public appearance. "

" It's an odd situation: I could not write about someone for whom I felt no affection or admiration. "

" Because my father is French, my first school was the Lycee Francais de Londres in Kensington. "

" When I wrote about Mary Wollstonecraft, I found that here she was, in the late 18th century, going to work for the 'Analytical Review.' What was the 'Analytical Review?' It was a magazine that dealt with politics and literature. "

" I was working at the 'Evening Standard' when I heard that there was a job going as deputy literary editor on the 'New Statesman.' I remember thinking, 'That's perfect.' It was three days a week, and I had children, but I could make that work - so I applied for it and got it. "

" Dickens is a lover of human beings; a relisher of human beings. "

" Writing Charles Dickens' biography is like writing five biographies. "

" Most writers can tell stories of how their books failed to be made into films. "

" Essentially, I spent most of my childhood with my mother and my older sister, and I suppose I had rather a romantic vision of how things might be if there were men around; I saw myself in a country house with six children and a garden. That has never been achieved - and I still regret it. "

" When I kept a diary, I realised that it was all moanings and depression, and I think that is quite common. "

" I've behaved badly in my life. I hope I haven't behaved as badly as Dickens! In a way, if you're a woman, you're not in a position to behave as badly, because you don't have the economic power. "

" One of my most vivid memories of the mid-1950s is of crying into a washbasin full of soapy grey baby clothes - there were no washing machines - while my handsome and adored husband was off playing football in the park on Sunday morning with all the delightful young men who had been friends to both of us at Cambridge three years earlier. "

" 'Words and Music' on Radio 3 is always a treat. Actors read passages of poetry and prose interspersed with music, and nobody tells you what it is. Later you can look it up online, but at the time you can't cheat. "

" I'm usually convinced that what I'm working on is a total disaster. "

" All writers behave badly. All people behave badly. "

" I have been left-wing always, from childhood. "

" If I'm in a state about a book, I'll get up at 6 A.M. and write before breakfast, but usually I'll start afterwards and then work a full day with a break for lunch. "

" All the people I have written about remain with me - perhaps they are my closest friends. "

" Dickens was very practical and sensible. "

" In 2007, several musicologists contacted me at about the same time, expressing interest in the work of the mysterious Muriel Herbert, a few of whose songs they had come across. "

" I sometimes think that, since I started writing biographies, I've had more of a life in books than I have had in my real life. "

" I always feel sad when I come to the end of a book. "