Claire Tomalin Quotes
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In 2007, several musicologists contacted me at about the same time, expressing interest in the work of the mysterious Muriel Herbert, a few of whose songs they had come across.
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Dickens had more energy than anyone in the world, and he expected his sons to be like him, and they couldn't be.
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When you live with Dickens for years, reading him and trying to present him as faithfully as you can, you can't fail to love the man - so the shock of his bad behaviour is considerable, even when you know it is coming.
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Essentially, I spent most of my childhood with my mother and my older sister, and I suppose I had rather a romantic vision of how things might be if there were men around; I saw myself in a country house with six children and a garden. That has never been achieved - and I still regret it.
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Writers often feel obliged to adopt some sort of public appearance.
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It's an odd situation: I could not write about someone for whom I felt no affection or admiration.
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When I wrote about Mary Wollstonecraft, I found that here she was, in the late 18th century, going to work for the 'Analytical Review.' What was the 'Analytical Review?' It was a magazine that dealt with politics and literature.
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I think it's quite normal for people to have love affairs.
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Because my father is French, my first school was the Lycee Francais de Londres in Kensington.
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'Philomena' was even better than I had expected. I was so pleased to see the evil Irish nuns thoroughly exposed, and I thought Judi Dench gave a flawless performance, as did everybody else.
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The whole world knows Dickens, his London and his characters.
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Writers don't make good spouses. When I am writing, I'm not a good wife. I shut myself away, and all my emotions are directed towards what I'm trying to write.
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Dickens is a lover of human beings; a relisher of human beings.
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Biographies are, in their nature, far more difficult to make into films than novels, because novels come with plots constructed and dialogue written, whereas I don't invent dialogue for my subjects or plot their lives for them.
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When dealing with a subject who is dead, you have this feeling of being God. You know who they're going to marry, when they're going to die. It's strange to feel so omniscient.
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Dickens belongs to the English people.
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I think it's about as likely Jane Austen was gay as that she was found out to be a man.
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Writing Charles Dickens' biography is like writing five biographies.
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The young Dickens was so alive, so self-confident, so funny.
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If I'm in a state about a book, I'll get up at 6 A.M. and write before breakfast, but usually I'll start afterwards and then work a full day with a break for lunch.
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Dickens is always full of surprises.
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As a young man, Dickens worked as a reporter in the House of Commons and hated it. He felt that all politicians spoke with the same voice.
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Dickens was very practical and sensible.
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Most writers can tell stories of how their books failed to be made into films.