Psychics tap into what is collective: our regret and our sense of time going by; our common repression and anxieties. Hilary Mantel anxietycollectivecommon Change image and share on social
I've got so many ideas, and sometimes the more exhausted my body gets, the more active my mind gets. Hilary Mantel activebodyexhaust Change image and share on social
Write a book you'd like to read. If you wouldn't read it, why would anybody else? Don't write for a perceived audience or market. It may well have vanished by the time your book's ready. Hilary Mantel audiencebookmarket Change image and share on social
When I wrote about the French Revolution, I didn't choose to write about aristocrats; I chose characters who began their lives in provincial obscurity. Hilary Mantel aristocratbegincharacter Change image and share on social
When narratives fracture, when words fail, I take consolation from the part of my life that always works: the stationery order. The mail-order stationery people supply every need from royal blue Quink to a dazzling variety of portable hard drives. Hilary Mantel blueconsolationdazzle share on social
Though I have never thought of myself as a book collector, there are shelves in our house browsed so often, on so many rainy winter nights, that the contents have seeped into me as if by osmosis. Hilary Mantel bookbrowsecollector Change image and share on social
Fiction leaves us so much work to do, allows the individual so much input; you have to see, you have to hear, you have to taste the madeleine, and while you are seemingly passive in your chair, you have to travel. Hilary Mantel chairfictionhear share on social
I think if I hadn't become a writer I would just have suppressed that part of my personality. I think I would have put it in a box that I never opened. Hilary Mantel boxopenpart Change image and share on social
Once you're labeled as mentally ill, and that's in your medical notes, then anything you say can be discounted as an artefact of your mental illness. Hilary Mantel artefactdiscountill Change image and share on social
When you have committed enough words to paper, you feel you have a spine stiff enough to stand up in the wind. But when you stop writing, you find that's all you are - a spine, a row of rattling vertebrae, dried out like an old quill pen. Hilary Mantel commitdryfeel share on social
