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Original sin is that thing about man which makes him capable of conceiving of his own perfection and incapable of achieving it.

'Original Sin' is one of those ideas that has been circulating for several years at the Marvel retreats we have a couple times a year. We have all these ideas floating around for a bit before we figure out how to align them.

I prefer writing originals.

The story I am writing exists, written in absolutely perfect fashion, some place, in the air. All I must do is find it, and copy it.

The most original sin is not the thinker's but the poet's.

Writing is my salvation. If I didn't write, what would I do?

Originality is nothing but judicious imitation. The most original writers borrowed one from another.

My works really begin in a very simple way. Sometimes it's an image, and sometimes it's words I might write, like a fragment of a poem.

In writing 'The Satanic Verses,' I think I was writing for the first time from the whole of myself. The English part, the Indian part. The part of me that loves London, and the part that longs for Bombay. And at my typewriter, alone, I could indulge this.

There's no such thing as an original sin.