“Novelists don’t have answers and ones that do I'm not sure you should trust.” — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
Writing is probably one-fifth coming up with the stuff, and four-fifths self-editing again and again and again. — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“The novelist is more like a pregnant woman who delivers her own child unaided. A messy procedure, with lots of groaning.” — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“I said something about reading not being knowledge, about knowledge without experience being food without sustenance.” — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
When I think about it, I'm happily bewildered that people will preorder my books They'll preorder me. What a lucky guy! — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
A book you finish reading is not the same book it was before you read it. — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
It's true that stammerers can become more adept at sentence construction. — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
Books don't offer real escape, but they can stop a mind scratching itself raw. — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“The art teacher's scarlet book was called Story of the Eye by Georges Bataille. 'As the title suggests,' Mr Dunwoody saw the… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
There's a disease that young writers are susceptible to, which is, I will do this because I can - hubris, I suppose… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
As for reading, I wish I had a magic door to a library where I could go in, read for days and… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
What do I miss? Second-hand bookshops where I can find things I had no idea I wanted. AbeBooks helps, but it doesn't… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“When you write it, don't write it in the manner of a spooky story. Don't try to give an explanation. Just say… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“The library refused many downloads, of course, but I succeeded with two Optimists translated from the Late English, Orwell and Huxley;” — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
I don't have problems starting writing. I have problems stopping. I'm one of the last dads to arrive at school to collect… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“Lunatics are writers whose works write them, Bat." "Not all lunatics are writers, Mrs. Rey-believe me." "But most writers are lunatics, Bat-believe… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
Mother used to say escape is never further than the nearest book. Well, Mumsy, no, not really. Your beloved large-print sagas of… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“A writer flirts with schizophrenia, nurtures synesthesia, and embraces obsessive-compulsive disorder. Your art feeds on you, your soul, and, yes, to a… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“Human life, Borges said, is a cascade of possible directions, and we take only one, or we perceive that we take only… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
I'm a novelist, that's how I make my livelihood, and I concentrate on the novels. — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
I often lose myself in the Sudoku-like challenges of making a book work. — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“In the next room a freckly girl Julia's age sat in a wheelchair. One of her legs wasn't there. She'd probably love to have… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“... Ethical cyberexplorers are responsible, yeah? We are friendly ghosts in the machine, not poltergeists or hooligans. We are a growing breed. Over sixty-five… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“I succumbed. Late-fifteenth-century verb, Old French succomber or Latin succumbere, but a basic necessity of the human condition, especially mine.” — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
“The second tunnel’s a Ministry of Defence tunnel...dug for a nuclear bomb shelter. The entrance is in the garden center at Woolworth’s in Great… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
War's an auction where whoever can pay the most in damage and still be standing wins. — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
The human world is made of stories, not people. The people the stories use to tell themselves are not to be blamed — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
So little is actually worthy of belief or disbelief. Better to strive to coexist than seek to disapprove . . . — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
I elbowed my way into the grubby café, bought a pie that tasted of shoe polish and a pot of tea with cork crumbs… — David Mitchell Copy Share Image
