Florence And Milan Had Given

You Think You're Writing One Historical Novel And It Turns Into Three, And I'm Quite Used To A Short Story Turning Into A Novel - That's Happened Through My Whole Career.

Some Readers Read A Book As If It Were An Instruction Manual, Expecting To Understand Everything First Time, But Of Course When You Write, You Put Into Every Sentence An Overflow Of Meaning, And You Create In Every Sentence As Many Resonances And Double Meanings And Ambiguities As You Can Possibly Pack In There, So That People Can Read It Again And Get Something New Each Time.

The Fate Of Peoples Is Made Like This, Two Men In Small Rooms. Forget The Coronations, The Conclaves Of Cardinals, The Pomp And Processions. This Is How The World Changes: A Counter Pushed Across A Table, A Pen Stroke That Alters The Force Of A Phrase, A Woman's Sigh As She Passes And Leaves On The Air A Trail Of Orange Flower Or Rose Water; Her Hand Pulling Close The Bed Curtain, The Discreet Sigh Of Flesh Against Flesh.

Cravats Grow Higher, As If They Mean To Protect The Throat. The Highest Cravats In Public Life Will Be Worn By Citizen Antoine Saint-just, Of The National Convention And The Committee Of Public Safety. In The Dark And Harrowing Days Of '94, An Obscene Feminine Inversion Will Appear: A Thin Crimson Ribbon, Worn Round A Bare White Neck.

Watching Live Actors Onstage, In Something That Changes Night By Night, Real People Picking Up Cues From Each Other, It Concentrates You On The Process Rather Than The Result.