From The Times, Saturday 3 April 2010
The Conversation interview of Philip Pullman by Erica Wagner

PP; Besides I've become much more interested in very simple, very stark storytelling, the sort that you get in folk tales; in the Scots ballads. I revel in them. The story opens so suddenly. They tell you who's there; they tell you what they did; and that's it.

EW writes; I love the Scots ballads as much as anyone does - we sit for a moment swapping lines from The Famous Flower of Serving Men and Sir Patrick Spens - but I'm forced to say I'm not sure the effect he strives for serves the story.