As soon as you start writing about how human beings interact with each other socially, you're into politics, aren't you? — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
But at the same time, I have trouble keeping things out of books, which is why I don't write short stories because… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
As I said, I had no publisher for What a Carve Up! while I was writing it, so all we had to… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
I became quite taken over by Johnson's personality at some points while writing the biography, and since I went straight on to… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
I have two ideas for novels at the moment, neither of them all that conventional, but I'm not ready to choose between… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
Luckily, in my case, I have managed, by writing, to do the one thing that I always wanted to do. — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
The writer I feel the most affinity with - you said you felt my books are 19th century novels, I think they're… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
You would go mad if you began to speculate about the impact your novel might have while you were still writing it. — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
Writers never feel comfortable having labels attached to them, however accurate they are. — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
It seems to me that you would have to write a novel on a very small, intimate scale for it not to… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
I was going to say 'my friend Stuart', but I suppose he's not a friend any more. I seem to have lost a number… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
“The upshot was that she lost her religion - with a vengeance - and walked out on him, taking these three daughters with her.… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
The plain fact is that she never really liked me, and never wanted me. I had been a mistake; and that, to some extent,… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
“Yes, she would have been partial to men, perhaps she might even have confined herself to one man in particular, if only she had… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
“You didn't take part, Benjamin?" Gunther asked, as he passed me a plate of cheese and cold meat. "My brother doesn't play games," said… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
As soon as you start writing about how human beings interact with each other socially, you're into politics, aren't you? — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
I like the idea of a big caesura between the narratives, a space which readers can fill in with their own speculative history. — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
The more melancholy side of my literary personality is much in tune with BS Johnson's. — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
I had no sense of any reputation that What a Carve Up! might acquire - at the time I didnt even have a publisher,… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image
But at the same time, I have trouble keeping things out of books, which is why I don't write short stories because they turn… — Jonathan Coe Copy Share Image