“People don't read any more. It's a sad state of affairs. Reading's the only thing that allows you to use your imagination. When you watch films it's someone else's vision, isn't it?"[Interview in The Independent, 15 October 2005]”

“It's like when you read a book and you know that the words are important, but the images blossoming in your imagination are even more important because it's your mind that allows the words to come to life.”

“People say they want to read about life but that's not what they want at all. They want a version of life. Don't you realize, someone else's version of someone else's life is still fiction? It's still a story. But it has no imagination. That's what you people have done. You've murdered imagination.”

“If you don't use your imagination someone else will use it for you.”

“But see, that's the thing about movies. Nothing is left to the imagination. You read a book, and you see a picture of the characters and the scenes in your mind. You don't have that with a movie. It's all either up there on the screen laid out for you, or it isn't there at all.”

“You know what your trouble is? You're the kind whoalways reads the handbook. Anything people build,any kind of technology, it's going to have some specificpurpose. It's for doing something that somebody alreadyunderstands. But if it's new technology, it'll openareas nobody's ever thought of before. You read the manual,man, and you won't play around with it, not the same way.And you get all funny when somebody else uses it to dosomething you never thought of.”