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" I've written something like 17 novels, which isn't bad, I suppose, but my father wrote 120 books, my mother 40. In comparison, I'm lazy. "
Deborah Moggach
Bad
Father
Lazy
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" Men take much more notice of older women in France, so I might move there. I think I'm a good bet. "
Deborah Moggach
Think
Women
Older Women
" Bringing my two children up while writing was just a part of life. I'd much rather have had their interruptions than been stuck in a sterile office. This way, I had welcome distractions. I had to load the washing machine, I had to go out and buy lemons. "
Deborah Moggach
Welcome
Children
Life
" I'm mad about gardening. I have an allotment on the other side of Hampstead Heath, and I keep three hens in my garden. "
Deborah Moggach
Three
Side
Mad
" Once you start cycling, the city opens up for you. No longer are you fighting it, hot and frustrated; no longer are you at the mercy of bus drivers, roadworks, decisions made by others and over which you have no control. Believe me, once you've tasted this freedom, you're hooked. "
Deborah Moggach
Me
Decisions
Freedom
" I wanted to be a landscape architect, but I trained as a teacher; I worked in publishing; I was a waitress. "
Deborah Moggach
Landscape
Teacher
Publishing
" Nothing beats weaving through the rush-hour traffic or whizzing past the eternal gridlock that is the Strand. "
Deborah Moggach
Traffic
Nothing
Past
" I am a great believer in having the power to end your life and knowing that, in extremis, you can. But I would not want to involve anybody else in my actions if it could imperil them. "
Deborah Moggach
Power
You
I Am
" I work every day from 9:30 or so until lunchtime. In the afternoons, I become a normal person - go shopping and do the garden and look after my grandchildren. "
Deborah Moggach
Look
Shopping
Work
" You can cycle through London on the side streets, which are less polluted - and much more interesting anyway. "
Deborah Moggach
More
Interesting
London
" My parents were both writers - they would type their manuscripts sitting side by side on the veranda of our house near Watford - so I wanted to do something different. I wanted to be a bluegrass singer, an architect, a landscape gardener, or to do something with animals. "
Deborah Moggach
Side
Landscape
Animals
" I was never a lonely child who sat looking at the rain sliding down the window. "
Deborah Moggach
Window
Rain
Looking
" The greatest artists know how to entertain, or else nobody would read them. "
Deborah Moggach
Nobody
Know
How
" I've had a very lucky life because I'm of this generation where everything was possible. "
Deborah Moggach
Lucky
Where
Possible
" I have a hippopotamus skull next to my bed, called Gregory. When I was six, my three sisters and I clubbed together and paid £4 for it in a junk shop. We collected owl pellets, ostrich eggs and sheep skulls for our natural history museum at home. "
Deborah Moggach
Together
Sheep
History
" It's not a failure if a marriage or partnership ends after a certain number of years. I think, in general, we expect too much of partners. We can't fulfil a person's every single need and, after ten years or so, many relationships wear out. If we were more philosophical about it, we wouldn't try to blame the other person or be bitter. "
Deborah Moggach
Think
Marriage
Failure
" Discover the times when you're most creative - mornings, nights, afternoons - and clear the time to work then. Many writers find the mornings are best, and the afternoons are only good for editorial corrections, or getting the washing done. Others can only work through the night, drunk. "
Deborah Moggach
Good
Work
Time
" I have four Rhode Island Red hens. I get two eggs from them a day. They're feathered dustbins that eat leftover food and weeds, and they're easy to look after - I throw some grain at them in the morning, take the eggs and that's it. I love the sound of clucking. "
Deborah Moggach
Day
Food
Love
" Writing a novel is a huge adventure; when it's going well it's more fun than fun. When it stutters to a halt put it aside. Go for a swim, go for a walk, take a week off. Don't panic or be afraid; you and your characters are in it together. Trust them to come to your rescue. "
Deborah Moggach
Together
Walk
Trust
" I hate fussing about in the kitchen when I have people over to supper, so I make a rich beef stew cooked in wine with carrots, sundried tomato paste and chopped chorizo sausage. "
Deborah Moggach
Rich
Wine
Hate
" My first novel, 'You Must be Sisters,' was started in Pakistan. I've wrote several novels and a TV drama set or partly-set there. "
Deborah Moggach
TV
Drama
First
" My favourite room in my house is easily the top room, which is a bedroom but also a bathroom, with a big, wooden carved bath, two huge fireplaces and a raised bit in the corner for performances. I've had some really lovely parties and poetry readings up there. "
Deborah Moggach
House
Bath
Two
" I'm always running my mouth off and getting myself in trouble, so I'm trying to do it less. "
Deborah Moggach
Always
Trying
Trouble
" If people want to take their lives and are helped to do so, the punishment is tragic for all concerned. "
Deborah Moggach
People
Want
Tragic
" You need to know the characters as living, breathing people before you start the plot; otherwise, you'll feel panic, anarchy and chaos. "
Deborah Moggach
Chaos
People
Start
" My perfect day is to work incredibly well in the morning and write something wonderful, then take the dog for a walk and go for a swim in the ladies' ponds on Hampstead Heath or work in my allotment. Then I get tarted up in the evening and go out in London to dinner or the cinema. "
Deborah Moggach
Work
Day
Dinner
" I feel as if someone is going to come along, feel my collar and say: 'Do you really think you can get people to read books you've made up about people that don't exist?' "
Deborah Moggach
People
Think
Feel
" Living apart is hardly possible if people have children together. It can also be more expensive to maintain two homes. But then, it's expensive to break up when you live in one property. "
Deborah Moggach
You
Together
Children
" The traditional writer is a sensitive only child, asthmatic, who sits on the window seat watching the drops of rain slide down the pane, very introspective. I'm not inward-looking. I would never go to a shrink. I don't want to know what I'm thinking. I don't really like discussions in my family. It may be an avoidance thing. "
Deborah Moggach
Thinking
Child
Family
" Living together places a huge burden on the other person to be lover, friend, entertainments manager, chef, domestic help, which is almost impossible and can lead to disappointment. If you don't live together, you spend more time with other people and ease the pressure off your lover. "
Deborah Moggach
Live
Time
Chef
" All I want is for people, when they read my books, to feel companioned, to feel they're not alone in the world. "
Deborah Moggach
World
Alone
Books