What I am is something unbearable for the world of journalism and the world of cliches. I'm a realist.

As for my support for Obama, remember that I was brought up in Washington. It was an all-black city when I was a kid. And I've always been very pro-African-American - or whatever phrase we now use.

I'm exactly as I appear. There is no warm, lovable person inside. Beneath my cold exterior, once you break the ice, you find cold water.

Wilson was very much school of Montaigne. Like Montaigne, he was not exactly misogynistic but he felt that the challenge of another male mind was the highest sort of human exchange while possession of a beautiful woman was also of intense importance to him.

Certainly 'The Judgment of Paris' was the novel in which I found my own voice.

Capote I truly loathed. The way you might loathe an animal. A filthy animal that has found its way into the house.

The truth about Pearl Harbour is obscured to this day. But it has been much studied.