I Have A Longing For

I Try To Write About Small Insignificant Things. I Try To Find Out If It’s Possible To Say Anything About Them. And I Almost Always Do If I Sit Down And Write About Something. There Is Something In That Thing That I Can Write About. It’s Very Much Like A Rehearsal. An Exercise, In A Way.

The Tree Was So Old, And Stood There So Alone, That His Childish Heart Had Been Filled With Compassion; If No One Else On The Farm Gave It A Thought, He Would At Least Do His Best To, Even Though He Suspected That His Child's Words And Child's Deeds Didn't Make Much Difference. It Had Stood There Before He Was Born, And Would Be Standing There After He Was Dead, But Perhaps, Even So, It Was Pleased That He Stroked Its Bark Every Time He Passed, And Sometimes, When He Was Sure He Wasn't Observed, Even Pressed His Cheek Against It.

As A Person, I'm Polite - I Want To Please.

I Never Read The Translation Before Publication. The Most Important Things For Me Is That The Emotion Is Captured In Such A Way That The Feelings That Are In The Original Are There, Much More Than The Details, If They Are Right Or Wrong.

The Way We Deny Death Says Something About How We Live Our Lives, Doesn't It? At Least In Sweden Or Scandinavia, You Don't Have To Search Further Back In Time Than Maybe Three Generations To Find Another Way To Relate To Death. People Then Had A Different, Closer Relationship With Death; At Least It Was Like That In The Countryside.