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" '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. "

Claire Tomalin

Better

Thought

See

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" Throughout his life, Dickens cared passionately about orphans. "

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

Claire Tomalin

Dickens

Writing

" Biographers search for traces, for evidence of activity, for signs of movement, for letters, for diaries, for photographs. "

" Writers don't make good spouses. When I am writing, I'm not a good wife. I shut myself away, and all my emotions are directed towards what I'm trying to write. "

" I was very priggish as a child. I saved up for a book on medieval English nunneries, for which I was despised by my friends. "

" The thing I love about Rome is that is has so many layers. In it, you can follow anything that interests you: town planning, architecture, churches or culture. It's a city rich in antiquity and early Christian treasures, and just endlessly fascinating. There's nowhere else like it. "

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

" I continually get more information about a subject after the book has been published. "

Claire Tomalin

Been

Book

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

Claire Tomalin

Closest

About

" In 1843, everybody was hungry, unemployed, and conditions were very bad. "

" The young Dickens was so alive, so self-confident, so funny. "

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

" I have been fascinated by Dickens worshippers who strenuously deny that he did anything wrong in relation to his wife, even though the record is clear that he did. "

" 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. "

" Dickens belongs to the English people. "

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

" Why do we read biography? Why do we choose to write it? Because we are human beings, programmed to be curious about other human beings, and to experience something of their lives. This has always been so - look at the Bible, crammed with biographies, very popular reading. "

" When you live with Dickens for years, reading him and trying to present him as faithfully as you can, you can't fail to love the man - so the shock of his bad behaviour is considerable, even when you know it is coming. "

" Dickens had more energy than anyone in the world, and he expected his sons to be like him, and they couldn't be. "

Claire Tomalin

World

Energy

" Dickens was very practical and sensible. "

" I had forgotten until I looked up old notes that I sold the film rights of my first book, a life of Mary Wollstonecraft: there was a lunch, a contract, a small sum of money, then nothing. "

" Dickens is always full of surprises. "

" Simon Russell Beale is an incomparable speaker of Shakespeare and a superb all-round actor. "

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

" 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. "

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

Claire Tomalin

Social Life

Life

" 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. "

" 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. "

Claire Tomalin

Same

Time

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