The artist who makes himself accessible is self-destructive..

I’ve often taken important classical, biblical or literary stories and interrogated them. I have tried to reinvigorate Lot by interpreting it differe….

I submit all my plays to the National Theatre for rejection. To assure myself I am seeing clearly..

A good play puts the audience through a certain ordeal..

When I write, I am not giving a lecture, I am speculating on behavior. Sometimes this is dangerous, but it should be. As I say often, theatre is a da….

Tragedy is the greatest art form of all. It gives us the courage to continue with our life by exposing us to the pain of life. It is unsentimental, i….

I am so far as I am aware not at all influenced by dramatists, expect for Shakespeare, who I have to say, it is impossible not to be influenced by if….

It is impossible - now, at this point in the long journey of human culture - to avoid the sense that pain is necessity; that it is neither accident, ….

Theatre should be a taxing experience: the greatest achievement of a writer is to produce a character who creates anxiety..

I have plenty of political views and plenty of social and personal prejudices. I do not, however, value them..

We are suffocated by writers who want to enlighten us with their truths. For me, the theatre is beautiful because it is a secret, and secrets seduce ….

I believe in poetic discourse, in the value of speech in a non-naturalistic way; it's speculative..

I'm not interested in entertainment..

I don't like sympathetic characters..

I never 'say' anything in my work. I invent a world. Let others decide what is being 'said'..

I'm not interested in observed reality..

You emerge from tragedy equipped against lies. After the musical, you're anybody's fool.