America is not the center of the universe.
America, ladies and gentlemen, has done more for me financially than Britain ever has, or ever could have done.
Everything I publish is for my readers.
False praise is worse than no praise.
For me, temptation is life and I have a gargantuan appetite for everything.
Human beings are definitely changing the planet, but how much impact they are having on climate, I don't know and I don't care.
I am absolutely convinced that my life was redeemed by poetry.
I cannot abide being bored.
I couldn't care less what anyone's 'perception' of me is. I'm too long in the tooth to care.
I have an over-attachment to precision, which is why I've sold more magazines than any man alive.
I have one talent, and that's figuring out what people want about two minutes before they know it themselves.
I hear poets complaining 'We face what our forebears did not face. We face TV. We face radio. We face this and that.'
I loathe and detest movies and television and don't watch any. I do not have the time.
I love the business of business; I love the risk raking.
I never sue journalists. I employ journalists. I employ too many of them. I don't sue journalists.
The vast majority of free verse is ghastly. Utterly ghastly. No one reads it. No one listens to it.
I only buy a computer when it's two years old, after the glitches have been worked out.
I thoroughly object to getting old. If you could let me be 16 again, I'd give you everything I've got and everything I'll ever have.
The beginnings of a forest is one of the ugliest things on the planet. It's bleak and your neighbours hate you.
When I was young, I wanted to be the greatest blues singer of all time. I wrecked my education and left home for it.
The reason I don't carry a mobile phone is I don't want people to know where I am!
People who get trapped in the tunnel vision of making money think that is all there is to life.
There are far too many people in university in Britain. If you want to make money, be a plumber.
You'll never get rich by working for your boss.
