Faraway events in the newspaper, I've come to the conclusion… I never read the book, but I read a review of a book that someone had written in America, saying that he thought that really the beginning of, sort of, corruption was when news became freely disseminated all over the world. He said, 'Local newspapers write about things that are within your control, to a certain extent. They're things that you know and see and can, if you want to, do something about. So it makes sense to read that sort of news. But when you read about distant famines and wars and horrors, it becomes, in the end, just some ghastly form of entertainment, because you can't do anything about it. It is nothing to do with you, really'. It's unreal, so if you're reading it, you're reading it for thrills or in order to enjoy horrors, or… you know? It is a dubious thing.

And I think it's even worse when you're seeing it. I loathe it. I can't bear it, actually, now. I never… I just don't watch dreadful things because it doesn't, in fact, give me any kick. It just gives me horrors, and why should I experience that horror when there's nothing I can do about it? But of course, it's never going to reverse. News is going to go on being as accessible, or more so, all over the world. But I do think it separates people from reality, in a funny way. They think they're getting more of it, but they're… they're not.