History Is Always Changing Behind Us, And

You're Only Young Once, They Say, But Doesn't It Go On For A Long Time? More Years Than You Can Bear.

I've Got So Many Ideas, And Sometimes The More Exhausted My Body Gets, The More Active My Mind Gets.

When I Came To Write My Thomas Cromwell Books, I Moved Onto The Center Ground Of English History, But I Was Never There Before. I Didn't Feel It Was My History Particularly, Coming From Northern Britain, Being Of Irish Extraction, Being A Cradle Catholic. The Image Of England I Grew Up With Felt Somewhere Else. There Was An Official England In Postcards, But It Wasn't One I Had Visited. But I Decided To March Onto The Center Ground And Occupy It Whether It Was Mine Or Not.

It Is The Absence Of Facts That Frightens People: The Gap You Open, Into Which They Pour Their Fears, Fantasies, Desires.

For Many Imaginative Writers, Working For The Press Is A Fact Of Their Life. But It's Best Not To Like It Too Much.