I don't try to shock. I'm trying to be your guide, to take you into a world that you might not feel comfortable in, but where I'll make you feel a little safer.

My policy is "unless you know the full story, don't judge", and you never know the full story.

Writing about my heroes was a way to tell my life through other people, so every chapter didn't have to be "I". I've written about people who have survived – either past crimes, one hit song, religious insanity or great success.

You should be depressed sometimes. If you just broke up with someone be sad, if you ran over somebody drunk driving feel depressed. You shouldn't take a pill that makes you feel OK about terrible things.

I've been through therapy. I believe in the talking cure, I believe in Freud. Penis envy? I have it!

Psychiatry taught me that you have to come up with your own version of neurotic happiness. I'm never going to be a normal person. No one changes, no one gets better – once you make friends with your neuroses you can plan a life.

If I wasn't doing this I'd be a defence lawyer for the criminals who did the crime but weren't sorry. Somebody has to speak for them.

Even my hangovers are scheduled. I don't have spontaneous moments. If I wasn't so structured, I might have time to go insane.

I live in four cities so I have four little lives. Four sets of underwear is the key to happiness.

I'm interested in all the new drugs, but also trepanation where you drill a hole in your head and you are high forever. It'd be a nice Christmas present.

Poppers are the only drug I still take. I used to take them on rollercoasters which was insane. I tried heroin, but itching and puking isn't my idea of fun.

As I've got older I've got less angry. I pay a little more to wear clothes that look like I got them in a thrift shop; I always had bad hair, now I have less hair.

How can I not think about death? My mother is at the end of her life, and I'm wondering who's going to take care of me. Hopefully the criminals I looked after in prison will.

My greatest pleasure is that I'm in good health. So many of my friends are not, which proves there's no such thing as karma. It's the cruelest thought, that life is random.

I could never kill myself. I approve of suicide if you have horrible health. Otherwise it's the ultimate hissy fit.

Catholics have more extreme sex lives because they're taught that pleasure is bad for you. Who thinks it's normal to kneel down to a naked man who's nailed to a cross? It's like a bad leather bar.



Role Models by John Waters is out soon in paperback (Beautiful Books, £8.99). He will be appearing at the Hay Festival of Literature on Saturday 28 May



To read all the interviews in this series, go to theguardian.com/thismuchiknow