Familial love can find an echo in our own hearts just as it did in that of Charles Dickens. Peter Ackroyd More Quotes by Peter Ackroyd More Quotes From Peter Ackroyd London has always provided the landscape for my imagination. It becomes a character - a living being - within each of my books. Peter Ackroyd imaginationcharacterbook I never read in bed, only in my study. Peter Ackroyd bedstudy Rioting has always been a London tradition. It has been since the early Middle Ages. There's hardly a spate of years that goes by without violent rioting of one kind or another. They happen so frequently that they are almost part of London's texture. Peter Ackroyd textureageyears I wanted to be a poet when I was 20; I had no interest in fiction or biography and precious little interest in history, but those three elements in my life have become the most important. Peter Ackroyd threeimportantfiction I don't know if I have a voice of my own. I don't see me being an important person with something to say. I haven't. I've got nothing to say. My opinion is of no consequence or value. Peter Ackroyd opinionvoiceimportant I enjoyed reading and learning at school, and at university I enjoyed extending my reading and learning. Once I left Cambridge, I went to Yale as a fellow. I spent two years there. After that, George Gale made me literary editor of 'The Spectator. Peter Ackroyd editorsreadingschool I have always believed that the material world is governed by nonmaterial sources, so that in that sense 'English Music' is an exercise in the spiritual as well as the material. I have always been attracted to the Gothic and spiritual imagination, and I've always been interested in visionaries. Peter Ackroyd imaginationspiritualexercise In 'The Plato Papers' I wanted to get another perspective on the present moment by extrapolating into the distant future. So in that sense, there's a definite similarity of purpose between a book set in the future and a book set in the past. Peter Ackroyd platobookpast It sometimes seems to me that the whole course of English history was one of accident, confusion, chance and unintended consequences - there's no real pattern. Peter Ackroyd english-historyconfusionreal It's only recently that we've discovered that the artist's inner self is somehow more important than the public world. I'm happier to create exterior pieces for the world rather than to express something I deeply feel or wish to say. Peter Ackroyd artistselfwish In London, I've always lived within 10 miles of where I was born. You see, there is something called a spirit of place, and my place happens to be London, at least once a fortnight. Peter Ackroyd bornlondonspirit I don't in any sense think of myself as a celebrity, which of course I'm not. Peter Ackroyd coursesthinking I detest self-regard. If my work has taught me anything, it is that self-aggrandisement is completely unhistorical. Peter Ackroyd regardtaughtself So do we discover, in the world, that our worst fears are Peter Ackroyd delightfearorder He stood beneath the white tower, and looked up at it with that mournful expression which his face always carried in repose: for one moment he thought of climbing up its cracked and broken stone, and then from its summit screaming down at the silent city as a child might scream at a chained animal. Peter Ackroyd climbinganimalchildren It is strange, is it not, how a person can adore one's soul so much that they adore one's body also? Peter Ackroyd strangebodysoul Under the force of the imagination, nature itself is changed. Peter Ackroyd forcechangedimagination Bigotry does not consort easily with free trade. Peter Ackroyd free-tradetradedoe The ordinary routines of life are never chronicled by the historian, but they make up almost the whole of experience. Peter Ackroyd historianwholeordinary Sometimes the silences, the gaps, tell us more than Peter Ackroyd gapssilencesometimes
