Poems Are Difficult To Silence.

But I Never Listen To Music While I'm Writing.

One Of My Favorite Writers Is Michel De Montaigne. My Wife Gave Me A Beautiful 17th-century Edition Of Montaigne's Essays Translated By John Florio. That's Probably My Most Precious Possession.

Compared To The Unleashed Forces Of Warfare And Of Faith, Mount Vesuvius Was Kinder To The Legacy Of Antiquity.

I Believe In Broken, Fractured, Complicated Narratives, But I Believe In Narratives As A Vehicle For Truth, Not Simply As A Form Of Entertainment, Though I Love Entertainment, But Also A Way Of Conveying What Needs To Be Conveyed About The Works That I Care About.

Literate Households In The 17th Century Would Have Had The Bible, John Bunyan's "the Pilgrim's Progress," And A Couple Of Other Books. Shakespeare Plays Were Cheap, So You Could Buy Those, But A Folio Cost A Pound, Which Was An Incredible Amount Of Money Then.