In India recently to attend the Jaipur Literature Festival, Hampton who started as a playwright and continues to write for stage as well believes it was vital for any writer to realise that writing for the two media required completely different approaches.

"I like doing both writing for stage and for films and both are radically different things. I had a natural flair for writing for stage and I made a mistake of thinking that writing films was easier," he said.

"It took me ten years in the business and working with some very good film makers to realise how the two jobs were radically different and equally challenging", he confesses.

The writer who has written a number of original screenplays, is however, best known for scripting two brilliant adaptations in the Dangerous Liasions and the recent Atonement.

While the Dangerous Liasions, a 1988 film which was an adaptation of the French novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses won him an Academy award for best adapted screenplay, Atonement, the adaptation of Ian McEwans best selling novel by the same name, has garnered seven Academy nominations this year.

Ask him whether he had a special flair for transforming existing works into screenplays, he says he enjoyed submerging himself into another persons work, provided he was passionate about it.

"I do enjoy doing adaptations. It is quite a technical job and I like submerging myself in someone else's work provided I am passionate about the book to be transformed into screenplay", says the playwright turned screen writer.

"Earlier I adapted novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses into Dangerous Liaisons and now I have done Atonement, the underlying fact is I was passionate about the two books. I first read the works and then applied for the job," he adds.

Asked about his nomination for the prestigious Academy award and his expectations from it, Hampton makes light of the issue.

While being recognised as the best by your peers was a great feeling, at the end of the day an Oscar means that your pay package increases, he jokes.

"Oscar means you are paid better", he says, adding, "It was undoubtedly very nice to be acknowledged by your peers."

It is however, people's appreciation for a film that counts more for Hampton than an Oscar.

"The greatest pleasure comes if your film lasts a long time. If ten years from now people still call Atonement a great work, it would be the most satisfying experience", he says.

He might have once said that asking a working writer what he thought about critics was like asking a lamppost how it felt about dogs. It was however, hard to remain unaffected by the critics' opinion, he accepts.

"All professional writers are very sensitive about critics and they tend to react badly to them. When I was young I used to write furious letters to them", he says.