“Footnotes are for proving and showing where you've been. Also, they're...” — Kevin Young Quote

“Footnotes are for proving and showing where you've been. Also, they're for the curious - they can then go and find the information on their own.”

“There's something about the kind of time travel that a poem can provide. It can take you to somewhere else - a culture far from you, a language far from you, but suddenly you're there. You're that person, seeing with that person's eyes. I think that's really tremendous. Even things like cinema or more traditional history can't quite do that.”

“When I'm in full-on writing mode and have the day, I try to get in my office around 10 A.M. and stop once 'Judge Judy' comes on at 4, when I quit and come down. Sometimes, I leave her on while I edit - if she can make the tough calls, then so can I.”

“I am worried that young Japanese people are not very curious about the outside world - which is so different to the way we were in the Sixties and Seventies. All they want to listen to is Japanese pop. They haven't even heard of Radiohead!”

“I can remember only a few of the strange and curious words now dead but living and spoken by the English people a thousand years ago.”

“I dug things up. I was curious. I liked to draw what I found.”