Life & Letters: If you can’t make a table…

Why do you write? The question is sometimes posed by interviewers or by members of the audience at book festivals. My answer is usually rather feeble. ‘Well,’ I say, ‘I can’t sing or play a musical instrument or dance, and I can’t draw. So what else is left to me but writing?’ This is true enough.

Why do you write? The question is sometimes posed by interviewers or by members of the audience at book festivals. My answer is usually rather feeble. ‘Well,’ I say, ‘I can’t sing or play a musical instrument or dance, and I can’t draw. So what else is left to me but writing?’ This is true enough. My art lessons ended at the age of nine, when the headmaster’s wife led me to her husband’s office with my latest artwork in hand. ‘Look at this’, she said. ‘This boy is wasting his time. He should be learning Greek.’