Fashion Is Fickle, And I Was Published

I Was At The Tail End Of The Family. The Next Brother Along Was Already Seven Years Older Than Me. I Remember Growing Up By Myself, Playing Games By Myself.

My Father Is From Newark In Nottinghamshire And My Mother Is From The Very North Of Ireland. They've Ended Up In Scotland, Where My Father - Well, Both Of Them - Will Always Be Seen As Having Come From Somewhere Else.

All We Need To Do, Reader Or Writer, From First Line To Final Page, Is Be As Open As A Book, And Be Alive To The Life In Language - On All Its Levels.

But Everything Written Has Style. The List Of Ingredients On The Side Of A Cornflakes Box Has Style. And Everything Literary Has Literary Style. And Style Is Integral To A Work. How Something Is Told Correlates With - More - Makes What's Being Told. A Story Is Its Style.

Nothing Is Harmful To Literature Except Censorship, And That Almost Never Stops Literature Going Where It Wants To Go Either, Because Literature Has A Way Of Surpassing Everything That Blocks It And Growing Stronger For The Exercise.