Sue Townsend

Live with all of your senses.

I always feel as if I'm a disappointment: that people want a grand dame in furs like Barbara Taylor Bradford.

I'd love a day devoid of responsibilities. I've often thought about going to a hotel just to have a day away from everything.

Watching 'The Jeremy Kyle Show' is my guilty pleasure.

I'm spectacularly disorganised. I wrote my latest book in seven different notebooks scattered throughout my house.

When all my kids were at home, I used to write from midnight onwards.

I do think that books, good books, free you. They make you feel a citizen of the world and things like class, sex and age don't matter. They're the greatest leveler.

I don't like to be noticed. The older I've got, the more reclusive I've become. I've got late-onset shyness. People are lovely. When they see me in the street, they don't ask for anything from me. They just say: 'I thought it was you, and I just wanted to say how much I enjoy your books,' but I can't seem to cope with it anymore.

My cream and black Aga. It is the heart of the house, and people congregate around it.

I prefer to keep my secrets to myself, to the grave... and beyond!

In the early days, it was, you know, I used to weep while I was writing. I used to grab at any kind of anything, any hint, any tip of how to make it easy.

I am from the working class. I am now what I was then. No amount of balsamic vinegar and Prada handbags could make me forget what it was like to be poor.

I've always been fascinated by totalitarian regimes. I'm not an admirer of them.

Yes, I hate it when people call me a 'national treasure'. It takes away your bite and makes you feel like a harmless old golden Labrador.

Most social problems could be helped or prevented if people had more money and practical advice.

I never imagined when I began writing in the early 1960s I'd become professional and my life would be transformed.

I used to think I had nice arms, but I don't even think that anymore.

Every time I start a new piece of work, I spend a long while under the duvet thinking I can't do it.

I seem to be able to get depressed quite easily without any reason.

I usually listen to the same thing over and over again: Tchaikovsky's Violin Concerto in D Major. And Leonard Cohen.