83 Quotes by Claire Tomalin

I think it's about as likely Jane Austen was gay as that she was found out to be a man.

I think it's quite normal for people to have love affairs.

I was working at the 'Evening Standard' when I heard that there was a job going as deputy literary editor on the 'New Statesman.' I remember thinking, 'That's perfect.' It was three days a week, and I had children, but I could make that work - so I applied for it and got it.

I was very priggish as a child. I saved up for a book on medieval English nunneries, for which I was despised by my friends.

I think people are always saying things are 'over.' Fiction has been regularly 'over' since the 19th century.

I thought it was a glorious thing to be a critic and to be a literary editor, and one was really doing something that mattered: to keep up standards, to take books seriously.

When I kept a diary, I realised that it was all moanings and depression, and I think that is quite common.

Today's children have very short attention spans because they are being reared on dreadful television programmes which are flickering away in the corner.

Everybody is vulnerable through love of their children. Hostages to fortune.