Most good essays are conversations with yourself - not just your decided thoughts but your dilemmas.
I'm fortunate in being able to find great satisfaction in my work.
In new work, we need to see the shadow, however faint, of previous literary effort.
Contradictory strands create an essay that's richly ambivalent.
Indeed, at times it's best to shut up.
The knowledge that my discriminations are skewed and not always universally desirable doesn't stop me in the least from making them.