Books: Inspirations: Novelist Romesh Gunesekera

The Place

Flying: Jumbo jet, glider, anything. A spaceship would be terrific. An aircraft cabin is a place that seems to be nowhere, but I find it steeped in the place left behind and the place ahead.

The Play

Two of the first plays I saw after I arrived in Britain were King Lear in Liverpool, and Antony and Cleopatra at Stratford. One was produced with hardly a backdrop and the other with gigantic scene changes. I was impressed by what connected the two: the words and their life beyond the stage.

The Film

Hitchcock was important in my novel, The Sandglass, and plays a cameo part in the reflections of Pearl, who loves Suspicion and The Thirty-Nine Steps.

The Artwork

The tiny black statue of an Indus valley girl dancing from about 2000BC which I saw in a museum, in Delhi, 15 years ago. It is only the size of a finger but it seems to speak across the millennia.

The Music

I find anonymous music frees me best. Chinese pop can be perfect. I can't decipher anything on the CD label, there is nothing I can hang on to. Then I get a real lift: I recognise something unexpectedly familiar and discover something surprisingly new at the same time.

Romesh Gunesekera's latest novel is 'The Sandglass' (Granta, pounds 6.99)