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" When you are a kid, a wolf is an amazing sight, so sumptuous. I sort of knew these were splendid creatures, that I was not going to find them outside roaming around. It was like a dog, but not a dog. It was incredible, a god! "

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" I don't like novels that tie everything up in a plot-y way. I always think that's not really true of life, particularly of people in power. "

Sarah Hall

Power

Think

Always

" I think you can tell any human story in a particular place. "

" Our lives are politically wound. "

" For its speculations to be taken seriously, dystopian fiction must be part of a discussion of contemporary society, a projection of ongoing political failures perhaps, or the wringing of present jeopardy for future disaster. "

" Show, don't tell, is a mantra repeated by tutors of creative writing courses the world over. As advice for amateurs, it is sound and helps avoid character profiling, unactivated scenes, and broken narrative frames. "

" When I moved back to Cumbria, one of the first things I did was locate a decent bookshop. "

" I've always been interested in wolves, since I was a child. There was a wolf enclosure in a wildlife park very close to where I was brought up; they were the main attraction. "

" I studied the short story as part of my creative writing course at university but then set off as a novelist. Generally, there is a sense that even if you want to write short stories, you need to do a novel first. "

" I was the feral, mud-bathing, tree-climbing variety of child. Why would I want to read about pirates when I could build a raft and terrorise sheep along the riverbanks? "

" Revisiting much-loved childhood novels is never easy. "

" I'm a home-roamer and can't do study or office scenarios. "

" Wonderful characters rotate around and through bookshops on a daily basis, competing with and possibly even triumphing over fiction when it comes to entertainment, strangeness and inspiration. "

" Swimming in the U.K. is not really about enjoying a sultry experience. It's about cold, clear acts of purification, and constitutional durability. It's about invigoration and bravado. "

" Short stories are often strong meat. Reading them, even listening to them, can be challenging, by which I do not mean hard work, simply that a certain amount of nerve and maturity is required. "

" I like extreme situations: people pushed out of their comfort zones; the civil veneer stripped off. "

" Fear is a relative thing; its effects are relative to power. "

" Over the years, I've lived in a variety of places, including America, but I was born and raised in the Lake District, in Cumbria. Growing up in that rural, sodden, mountainous county has shaped my brain, perhaps even my temperament. "

" The short story is very good at looking at shadow psychologies and how the system breaks down underneath. "

" Art history became an A-level option at my school the year I started sixth form. This happened because another student and I cajoled and bullied the head of the art department into arranging it with the examination board. "

" I wander around the house and write in bed, at the kitchen table, by the window, in the yard. "

" I was useless at science. I was never going to be an astrophysicist. "

" Writers cannot simply have a go, imagining it's easier to produce a story than a novel because fewer words are required. Have a go by all means; be intrepid, but be equipped. "

Sarah Hall

Than

Words

" My writing is called exotic or avant-garde because I write about rural places. Has it really come to this, that if you write about the country you are avant-garde? How did this happen? Modern agriculture and spaces are still so relevant. "

" Swimming in the cold and the dark of British autumn is not for the faint-hearted. "

" I can gabble on now, but I couldn't when I was a kid, so I spent a lot of time in my own head on the moors by myself. It felt like writing was the right way to express myself. "

" It's a lovely feeling, just working away at the desk, putting words down, building words up... I think you have to be aware that what you're doing is not just a private act, it's a societal thing. "

" I don't see that books can be written without political context - not if they're relevant and ambitious. "

" There was a lot of fiction I did not enjoy, whose landscapes seemed bland and unevocative, the characters faint-hearted within them, the very words lacking vibrancy. "

" I am a feminist, although I always worry saying that because you then get people asking you about the 1970s. "

" I married an American. He was from the Pacific Northwest but went to law school in the South, so I was living in Virginia and North Carolina. "