Books don't exist unless you read them. And it's a two way process - you write the book as you read it and you fill in the gaps. You discover it and you put the marks together and without you doing it they're just marks.

I'm rather proud of having been a trainspotter.

I mean I think children love the idea that there are different viewpoints and different words for things and different worlds. And the more that they pretend to be other people, the harder it is for them to hate them and misunderstand them when they grow up.

I'm not very good at relaxing. Reading's the main thing. On the bus, on the tube, on the loo. Literally all the time. I mean, I don't think there's a moment of the day when I wouldn't be if I was left alone.

When you are in a bad production there are two things you can do. You can do your best or you can leave. I chose to do the third thing which was sulk.

Most good art is left wing. It's a moot point whether there is any good right-wing art.

I absolutely love working with my dad because there is such an ease about it, and I also love his company.

My one remaining professional ambition is to read the shipping forecast. I live in hope.

Where licentiousness begins, liberty ends.

[P]erfect freedom consists in obeying the dictates of right reason, and submitting to natural law. When a man goes beyond or contrary to the law of nature and reason, he . . . introduces confusion and disorder into society . . . [thus] where licentiousness begins, liberty ends.

If you play a part that's been done before, on stage for instance, you feel like you're carrying a torch and staggering under the weight of it for a bit and then passing it on to somebody else.

At heart, this job is about continuing to make great theatre for the people of Sheffield - a city I've known and loved since childhood.

Stamps from Afghanistan are hilarious. You can tell when the revolutions are because suddenly they stop having pictures of the mullahs and the independence monument and they start having fish on them.