Global warming is more of a blessing than a curse.

In 1980, I published my first novel, in the usual swirl of unjustified hope and justified anxiety.

What you end up remembering isn't always the same as what you have witnessed.

Why does the writing make us chase the writer? Why can't we leave well enough alone? Why aren't the books enough?

We thought we were being mature when we were only being safe. We imagined we were being responsible but were only being cowardly. What we called realism turned out to be a way of avoiding things rather than facing them.

Why should anything happen when everything has happened?

We live with such easy assumptions, don't we? For instance, that memory equals events plus time. But it's all much odder than this. Who was it said that memory is what we thought we'd forgotten? And it ought to be obvious to us that time doesn't act as a fixative, rather as a solvent. But it's not convenient--- it's not useful--- to believe this; it doesn't help us get on with our lives; so we ignore it.