John Cooper Clarke
I went to what can only be described as a slum school in Salford - rough and full of trainee punks - but I was very lucky in that I had one inspiring teacher, John Malone, who gave the whole class an interest in romantic poetry.Collection: Teacher
If you want to know why the coast is such an inspirational place, ask Herman Melville, Jack London, Nordhoff and Hall, Robert Louis Stevenson or Joseph Conrad. It's a glimpse of eternity. It invites rumination, the relentless whisper of the tide against the shore.Collection: Inspirational
I've always lived all over the place, and left Manchester the minute I was old enough to steal a car.Collection: Car
Dutch food is terrible, I think. What sort of person starts the day with egg and cheese?Collection: Food
When you write poetry you are always addressing the world somehow.Collection: Poetry
Happiness is the target one only has to aim at in order to miss.Collection: Happiness
My dad was an electrical engineer.Collection: Dad
Being unapologetic means never having to say you're sorry.
I've got a speech impediment.
I've been kept from honest employment for a long, long time now. Thank God!
My look was based on the Madison Avenue guy who's just lost his job. Ivy League suit a bit scuzzed up, an outgrown layer cut and five o'clock shadow.
I got to play The Vortex in London with the Buzzcocks, the Fall, me and Johnny Thunders And The Heartbreakers. That was a serious Manchester night.
I wanted to get rich, like anyone from my background.
Find a poet whose style you like, emulate that style, then deal with things that you know about - don't waste your time looking for your own style.' I wish I could remember who told me that, because I'd like to congraulate him. I've emulated all the old guys - Tennyson, Alexander Pope.
All the best musicians started out in church; Jesus invented rock 'n' roll.
The '80s were a lost decade.
Well, I've obviously been a great source of inspiration to the academic population of Salford! They're citing me as a major contribution to their upward trajectory!
I love singing. I'm a great singer.
I had a million jobs before I managed to make a living out of poetry.
My favourite writers are columnists.
It amazes me there are movies about writers... such inert, uneventful lives.
You know how the Marvel Comics superheroes formed themselves into the Justice League of America - Batman, Flash and the rest. Why did Superman join? He never needed any help.
When you're doing poetry like mine that rhymes, it's very easy to sound like a song that didn't work out!
There is a certain sentimental vibe in my home town of Manchester, which you would sort of expect.
From social pariah to King of the World? It's taken 45 years, so I've been able to adjust to it!
I'm not much of a team player when it comes to making records, I've got to say.
I've had a few jobs, but if you want to be a writer, you're better off getting a job that doesn't require that you do anything.
You can always find something better to do than writing when you're at home.
Maybe there are luckier people than me, but I don't know who that would be. I feel pretty lucky. I've had a nice life - I don't know how I could be luckier.
I'm not giving away sartorial secrets but the trousers I wear cost 19 quid.
Most cities are the same.
I love the Arctic Monkeys!
Too many memoirs focus on childhoods and it's a bit turgid.
There've been lots of positive changes in the city since I worked at Salford Tech in the seventies, and I'm pleased to be known as Salford's Bard and to have helped put it on the map.
I'm a great reader of credits; I never leave the cinema before they finish.
Not everyone is prepared for fame, not even at the level I got it. One minute you're just a face in the crowd, next minute everyone wants a piece of you.
Fame just ain't a natural situation. But I shouldn't have worried because everyone thought I was a bit famous even before I'd done anything; people just assumed I was famous.
I'd like to be rich, but without all the downside of fame.
They're very different things, a poem and a song, you wouldn't think they would be, but they are.
The main thing a poem ought to be is musical. It should be rhythmic. You should hear it as a musical piece in your head as you're writing it.
My declining allure is a source of great sadness to me.
Doris Day was the perfect woman.
I eat like a pig. Tripe is the only thing I won't eat.
At the beginning, there was no chance I'd get published so I thought I'd give it a go live. I had to perform in rock band places and working men's clubs, where you wouldn't expect to find poetry. I ploughed a lonely furrow.
Lyrics became important for a while in the late Seventies. Patti Smith was a poet and a rock star, as much one as the other, the distinctions were a bit blurred and then you get swept up in it. Punk poet, it's a good enough term.
I love being in a car.
I enjoy gigging in industrial towns. It seems to be where I go down the best. Somewhere where they have a history of manufacturing, they're my favourite places to play.
I love being on my bike, but I don't consider that a sport: it's too pleasant.
When I sit down to eat, the greatest spice of all is hunger.
I hate chickpeas. I like hummus but I ate that before I realised it was made out of chickpeas.