As A Writer, I Write

I Think Technique Can Be Taught But I Think The Only Way To Learn To Write Is To Read, And I See Writing And Reading As Completely Related. One Almost Couldn't Exist Without The Other.

Yes, Though I Have Nothing But Gratitude For My Upbringing In The Church.

Without The Book Business It Would Be Difficult Or Impossible For True Books To Find Their True Readers And Without That Solitary (and Potentially Subversive) Alone With A Book The Whole Razzmatazz Of Prizes, Banquets, Television Spectaculars, Bestseller Lists, Even Literature Courses, Editors And Authors, Are All Worthless. Unless A Book Finds Lovers Among Those Solitary Readers, It Will Not Live . . . Or Live For Long.

Ireland Is A Peculiar Society In The Sense That It Was A Nineteenth Century Society Up To About 1970 And Then It Almost Bypassed The Twentieth Century.

I Think That Each Of Us Inhabits A Private World That Others Cannot See. The Only Difference Between The Writer And The Reader Is That The Writer Is Able To Dramatise That Private World.