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" To me, my characters are more real than most people I meet. "

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" The first novel I wrote was a monster - clocking in at 180,000 words - but it died a death, a death it deserved. It was called 'The Gods First Make Mad.' It was a good title, but it was the only good thing about the book. I didn't let that put me off. "

" I think money is essential to happiness and right now I wouldn't want to be anyone other than Wilbur Smith - I've had a fantastic life, rewarded far more heavily than I deserve. Maybe I'd like to be J. K. Rowling, but I'll settle for second best. "

" They say I'm worth either €200 million, €100 million, €50 million or €10 million, but that's something between God, the HMRC and myself. "

" I'm a feminist. The women in my books in recent years have been powerful characters and I love to see a woman with a cute bottom walking past. "

" My family wasn't terribly affluent and looked upon money very carefully as something that had to be saved, not spent. My father built the ducting that took air into the copper mines and made about 6 d a yard in the Thirties, which was good money back then. "

" It's probably true that everyone has a book in them, although it may not be a very good one. "

" I hate politics. I like to write about it, but to get involved in it, to try and make a lot of ignorant people do what you want them to do, waste of time. Go and write a book. It's more important and it'll last longer. "

" At the age of 12 I won the school prize for Best English Essay. The prize was a copy of Somerset Maugham's 'Introduction To Modern English And American Literature.' To this day I keep it on the shelf between my collection of Forester's works and the little urn that contains my mother's ashes. "

" As regards to personal safety, you do have to be careful not to put yourself at risk when travelling in South Africa. You don't want to go out exploring at night, for example. "

" My absolute favorite pieces are 'Rhapsody in Blue' and 'Begin the Beguine.' I play these when I am working. "

" People don't really know themselves until they're 30. Like most people nowadays, I went to university, got a degree and wandered for a bit. I trained to be a chartered accountant, which I didn't much enjoy, and it was only slowly that the idea of becoming a creative writer gelled. "

" I wanted to be a great white hunter, a prospector for gold, or a slave trader. But then, when I was eight, my parents sent me to a boarding school in South Africa. It was the equivalent of a British public school with cold showers, beatings and rotten food. But what it also had was a library full of books. "

" I love the sea as much as I love the veldt of Africa. "

" I never set out to write literature; I set out to tell stories. And some of my work may be very raunchy and very bloodthirsty - but life, for me, is a violent thing. "

" The mistake the apartheid government made was they gave the black people nothing, so they had nothing to lose. But now a lot of the former freedom-fighters are big-time capitalists. They've been given directorships in every major company. They're billionaires! "

" They say if you drink Zambezi water with your mother's milk, you are always a slave of Africa, and I am. "

" Real men read my books. "

" I don't want children. Why should I let some strange little monster into my life to destroy what to me is a perfect set-up? "

" When I vacate this sack of old bones I won't care what you do with it. Bury or burn it but don't make much fuss. "

" I have never had too much trouble for creative ideas to spring up in my mind. "

" You know that feeling when you finish a final exam and you think, 'I never want to do that again'? Well I have the same feeling when I finish a novel. Each time I say, 'I think I may retire now' and then after six months the ideas start to churn again. I could never stop. "

" I am a closet birdwatcher. I can identify Southern African species, but it irks me I can barely tell a jay from a blackbird in the U.K. "

" What I like about writing is the sense of godlike power it gives you. "

" Despite the fact that I spend a lot of time in London, Switzerland and New York, Africa is the place I know and love best, and my heart will always lie here. "

" I read a lot of biographies and books with an African background. "

" Literature throws us many great heroes. Real life invariably outdoes them. "

" I think one of the most poignant things is unrequited love and loneliness. "

" My mother-in-law speaks not a word of English. I speak not a word of Tajiki. So I smile at her ingratiatingly and she fixes me with a beady eye. "

" There's nothing so aphrodisiacal for a woman as money and success. "

" Write for yourself, not for a perceived audience. If you do, you'll mostly fall flat on your face, because it's impossible to judge what people want. And you have to read. That's how you learn what is good writing and what is bad. Then the main thing is application. It's hard work. "