Scarlett Thomas (born 1972 in Hammersmith) is an English author. She has written eight novels, including The End of Mr. Y and PopCo, and teaches Creative Writing at the University of Kent. Read full biography of Scarlett Thomas →
Honesty and authenticity are a big deal for me.
I hate stereotypes and I hate cliche.
I'm a great believer in gathering together all your obsessions and seeing if you can make a novel out of them.
I think predictability is built into any good novel in some way - you begin reading Anna Karenina and you know pretty much what's going to happen... →
Everything I know I imagine everyone else knows as well. And then everything that everyone else knows I imagine they know on top of what I know, so... →
It's not even a question of whether the universe is meaningful or meaningless. It's in what way could it be meaningful, or in what way, if it... →
You can't do science in a novel, but you can do philosophy. Or, if you're really lucky, you can manage to pose a question in such a way that... →
My novels are high concept. I guess big ideas interest me more than, say, the minutiae of domestic life.
One of the biggest problems for beginning writers is this need to over-explain.
In some ways I'm a frustrated scientist or mathematician. The amount of times I've thought I'd go back to university and do theoretical... →
Scarlett Thomas (born 1972 in Hammersmith) is an English author. She has written eight novels, including The End of Mr. Y and PopCo, and teaches Creative Writing at the University of Kent.