One of the things that probably drew me to writing was that it was something you could get on with by yourself. Publishing means going public. But the actual activity could scarcely be more invisible. And private. — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
There's no such thing as the contemporary novel. Before I seem the complete reactionary, let me add that I've happily joined in many discussions about 'the contemporary novel' where what that usually, unproblematically means is novels that have appeared recently… — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
I like the world we've got. If there is anything special and magical, I have to find it in the ordinary stuff. — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
The idea of stopping is not unmeaningful to me. I think there might be a time when, in theory at least, you'd say, 'Well… — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
There has always been, for me, this other world, this second world to fall back on--a more reliable world in so far as it… — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
My upbringing was absolutely not the archetypal writer's upbringing. Even, arguably, the opposite. — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
As a novelist, I suppose I can say that I'm highly articulate. But I know, as a person, in other ways, I'm not always… — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
“There’s this thing called progress. But it doesn’t progress, it doesn’t go anywhere. Because as progress progresses the world can slip away. It’s progress… — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
“And books, she knew by then, were one of the necessities, the rocks of her life.” — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
Structure that really pays off is all based on emotion. I don't write down an elaborate plan. It's really done by feel. It's one… — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
The novel that's contemporary in the sense of being wholly 'of now' is an impossibility, if only because novels may take years to write,… — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
“But this would have been to ignore the young man of only twenty-five, who, for all his, by now, increasing and debilitating proneness to… — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
In my work you often get an abrupt shift in time, a jolt. But the emotional logic will take the reader on. I hope.… — Graham Swift Copy Share Image
