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" That's why writing is important to me. Time goes past, and you've been somewhere and come back that hasn't hurt you, and you've been somebody else. "

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" I have written favourably in support of subsidy for the arts since the 1960s, and I continue to believe absolutely in subsidy, as I do in the BBC licence fee. "

" Magna Carta has 63 clauses in abbreviated Latin. Two of them that are still on the statute book, numbers 39 and 40, could be said to have changed the way in which the free world has grown. "

" Compared to the big 19th-century novelists, I've got a slim volume of work. "

" The best of pop in our country is among the best of the arts that we do. And Britain does the arts as well as, and sometimes better than, anybody else on the planet. "

" To give religion two minutes a day, in its own space, isn't exactly selling general morality or atheism short. "

" I think television does tease out a certain vanity in everybody when you look at yourself and you go, 'Oh Christ.' Maybe that's why my intros get shorter and shorter. "

" The idea that popular arts were shallow by definition and the traditional arts were profound was dead, I thought, and I wanted to prove it. "

" In an arts programme, my job was to go where the talent was. And the talent was in popular culture. "

" Few places on earth have been as affectionately alchemised into literature as the Lake District. "

" Control, like curiosity, can be an exterminator. "

" It is in our culture that we don't want to admit that our culture is good. "

" I don't get nervous when I'm interviewing someone on film - it can be cut, and we can do it again. It is quite nerve-racking doing things live. "

" I don't want closure, I don't know what that means or why you would want it. "

" The abolition of slavery was driven by the King James Bible. It gave slaves a common language and purpose. "

" There are two big beasts in the arts: the BBC and Sky Arts - challenging, leading the way. "

" I was brought up in a strong working-class community by working-class parents and relations until I was 18, and that's what I really am. Now all sorts of things have been added, but that's what I am. "

" Britain is undoubtedly becoming more cultural. No question of it. People who say it is dumbing down simply don't look around enough. They don't know enough. "

" The class barricades have been stormed by the forces of a broad culture, which is made up of clusters of individuals who have decided for themselves what they will be in society. "

" Darwin talks about evolution, but he doesn't say how it started. Maybe the sense of mystery will dissolve in the face of science, but I am not so sure. We are all described by the human genome, but it's getting people nowhere. "

" Miliband failed us, his Labour supporters. And Labour will now, because of him, be in a disaster zone for a long time. "

" We were working class, and you don't lose that. Later on, I bolted on media middle class... and now people like me are in the House of Lords. "

" Dame Barbara Cartland was an endearing eccentric, and when I interviewed her, she wanted me to listen to her dictating to her secretary one of those romantic novels that she turned out fortnightly. "

" I enjoy writing. Would I rather be playing golf? No. Would I rather be fishing? No. "

" I decided years ago that I am just unfashionable. "

" I do think the BBC could do more, but I've always thought the BBC could do more - I think there should be more arts programmes full stop. "

" It was my idea for high culture and popular culture to be treated equally. "

Popular Culture

" I was born in a radio world, and I got so much from it. "

" I'm a class mongrel. "

" Too old at 72? Careful. Ageism is out. We'll have the law on you! "

" My life is not very different from what it was 20 years ago. In fact, my career hasn't changed much since I was 22. "