Q & A's

Latest Q & A's

I am privileged to have so many of you send through your questions about my work – thank you. I am afraid that I will not be able to answer all of them, but please still send your questions and I will do my very best to answer as many as I can.

Question:

Dear Mr Pullman, You are a genius, a legend. I am 13 and deeply admire your 'His Dark Materials' trilogy and look forward to read your future works. Can you please recommend some books to read. Thank you, Amogh

Asked on 21/03/2012 19:06:37

Answer:

Thank you very much. It’s hard to recommend books without knowing anything about what you’ve read so far and what your reading tastes are, but one book that never fails is Rudyard Kipling’s Kim.

Question:

Do you have other hobbies except writing?

Asked on 18/03/2012 16:36:54

Answer:

Yes, I like making things out of wood. I’ve just had a new workshop built, and I expect to be spending quite a lot of non-writing time in there in the future.

Question:

How did you start to write books?

Asked on 18/03/2012 16:35:22

Answer:

There was never a time in my whole life when I wasn’t telling stories of one kind or another. I gradually came to realise the need to be disciplined for a long period if I wanted to finish a novel.

Question:

How many books have you written?

Asked on 18/03/2012 16:33:40

Answer:

Over twenty. I can’t count exactly because they move about. They’re like the stones in the Rollright Circle in Oxfordshire. If you go round one way counting there are 42, if you go round the other there are 43. Or 41. Or more. Or fewer.

Question:

In The Subtle Knife chapter 4 it descibes the golden compass working as moving to different levels which change the meaning of the symbols. I am working on my own non-fiction book about just such a system so I was a bit shocked to see the idea so plainly put down on paper. I got my idea from Hofstadter book GEB that he published in 1979. Was you inspiration from the same stem or any other? James Conway Seattle conwayjames3@hotmail.com

Asked on 16/03/2012 12:22:12

Answer:

Sometimes writers come up with the same idea quite independently, as I’m sure has happened in this case. I expect we read the same books at some point, or else we were thinking about the same problems.