YOU LET ME DROWN!” Owen said. “YOU DIDN’T DO ANYTHING! YOU JUST WATCHED ME DROWN! I’M ALREADY DEAD!” he told us. “REMEMBER THAT: YOU LET ME DIE.

I'm a very old-fashioned novelist. I write 19th-century novels, where a lot of rules apply.

Patriotism is not necessarily defined as blind devotion to a president's particular agenda - and that to dispute a presidential policy is not necessarily anti-American.

What a phrase that is: 'that explains everything!' I know better than to think anything 'explains everything' today.

This was not of the nature of a Christlike lesson for Owen Meany to learn, as he lay in the manger, that someone you hate can give you a hard-on.

Thus we try to keep our heroes alive; hence we remember them.

So, I don't work in terms of real time. I don't work in a timely fashion.