“I was determined that in fiction anyway two men should fall in love and remain in it for the ever and ever that fiction allows.”

“A happy ending was imperative. I shouldn't have bothered to write otherwise. I was determined that in fiction anyway two men should fall in love and remain in it for the ever and ever that fiction allows, and in this sense, Maurice and Alec still roam the greenwood.”

“Fiction is hardly ever fiction.”

“Writing fiction is not a profession that leaves one well-disposed toward reading fiction. One starts out loving books and stories, and then one becomes jaded and increasingly hard to please. I read less and less fiction these days, finding the buzz and the joy I used to get from fiction in ever stranger works of non-fiction, or poetry.”

“And if they're fictional, it is entirely acceptable to cheat on fictional men with other fictional men.”

“No one in life can ever match fiction”