I think it’s also the case that I’m not as widely travelled, or as well-educated in history, as most of the other novelists I meet: so I have to write about my own country, at the present time, because it’s more or less all I know about! Jonathan Coe Read Quote
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 into novels. Jonathan Coe Read Quote
I became quite taken over by Johnson’s personality at some points while writing the biography, and since I went straight on to The Closed Circle afterwards, I did sometimes feel I could hear him whispering in my ear while I was working on it. Jonathan Coe Read Quote
My only regret is that I signed away the world rights and in America they’ve been far and away my most successful books, but I never saw a cent from any of it. Jonathan Coe Read Quote
As I said, I had no publisher for What a Carve Up! while I was writing it, so all we had to live off was my wife’s money and little bits I was picking up for journalism. Jonathan Coe Read Quote
It’s only a drawback in the States, where most people seem to have no real interest in other countries and the notion of a novel which might offer insight into life in the UK doesn’t seem to appeal very widely. Jonathan Coe Read Quote
