Susanna Clarke

“I tell stories. I kind of stumbled on that by trying to combine Jane Austen and magic.”

“I first became an Alan Moore fan in Covent Garden on a Saturday afternoon in 1987, when I bought a copy of 'Watchmen,' his graphic novel about ageing superheroes and nuclear apocalypse.”

“Bright yellow leaves flowed swiftly upon the dark, almost-black water, making patterns as they went. To Mr. Segundus the patterns looked a little like magical writing. 'But then,' he thought, 'So many things do.”

“It's not easy to convey to someone who doesn't read comics just how Alan Moore has dominated the field since 'Watchmen.'”

“It might well appear to Sir Walter that there had been no quarrel. It was often the case that gentlemen did not observe the signs.”

“Oh! And they read English novels! David! Did you ever look into an English novel? Well, do not trouble yourself. It is nothing but a lot of nonsense about girls with fanciful names getting married.”

“It seemed that it was not only live magicians which Mr. Norrell despised. He had taken the measure of all the dead ones too and found them wanting.”

“Where have they gone?" "Wherever magicians used to go. Behind the sky. On the other side of the rain.”

“Alan Moore is a peculiarly unsung triumph of British culture, and Northampton, where he was born in 1953, the son of brewery worker Ernest and printer Sylvia, is where you must go to find him.”

“He had discovered that it was easier – far easier than any one could have supposed – to make oneself mad, but like all magic it was full of obstacles and frustrations. Even if he succeeded in summoning the fairy (which did not seem very likely), he would be in nocondition to talk to him. Every book he had ever read on the subject urged magicians to be on their guard when dealing with fairies. Just when he needed all his wits, he would have scarcely any wits at all.”

“I am, as far as I can tell, about a month behind Lord Byron. In every town we stop at we discover innkeepers, postillions, officials, burghers, potboys, and all kinds and sorts of ladies whose brains still seem somewhat deranged from their brief exposure to his lordship. And though my companions are careful to tell people that I am that dreadful being, an English magician, I am clearly nothing in comparison to an English poet and everywhere I go I enjoy the reputation- quite new to me, I assure you- of the quiet, good Englishman, who makes no noise and is no trouble to any one...”

“Above all remember this: that magic belongs as much to the heart as to the head and everything which is done, should be done from love or joy or righteous anger.”

“She doesn't do the things heroines are supposed to. Which is rather Jane Austen's point - Fanny is her subversive heroine. She is gentle and self-doubting and utterly feminine; and given the right circumstances, she would defy an army.”

“The phone conversations about a possible TV series of 'Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell' stretch back years, but now that the moment has come, now that I am actually here at Wentworth Woodhouse, I lose my bearings.”

“For the rest of the night he sat by himself under the elm-tree. Until this moment it had never seemed to him that his magicianship set him apart from other men. But now he had glimpsed the wrong side of something. He had the eeriest feeling - as if the world were growing older around him, and the best part of existence - laughter, love and innocence - were slipping irrevocably into the past.”

“Magic, madam, is like wine and, if you are not used to it, it will make you drunk.”

“I had always been fascinated by comics, but it had taken me several weeks to make up my mind to buy 'Watchmen'; for someone on a publisher's assistant's salary, it was some quite unheard-of sum of money.”

“Beware Stephen! There will probably be a magical combat of some sort. I daresay I shall have to take on different forms – cockatrice, raw head and bloody bones, rains of fire, etc., etc. You may wish to stand back a little!”

“When you're writing, you're creating something out of nothing ... A successful piece of writing is like doing a successful piece of m”

“But the other Ministers considered that to employ a magician was one thing, novelists were quite another and they would not stoop to it.”