Actual Thrills

That’s the funny thing. Having written a number of books by now, I’m starting to realize you’re not as in control as you think you are about what you make, and the books you write are not necessarily the books you wanna write, or the books you think: ‘This is the best possible book that could be written right now.’ It’s actually just something much more mysterious, and the book comes from some part of you that’s not evaluating things on those scales. It comes from some part of you that’s not asking whether it’s good or bad, and not trying to fit it into your own intellectual framework of what’s good or bad. It comes from something much, much, much deeper in the self and, by the time you’re done, should have some quality of inevitability, at least to yourself. More inevitability than perfection or the ability to be stood behind in a proud sort of way. The more books I write, I’m starting to not feel like that’s what it’s about, making art. I’m starting to not feel like it’s about making something that you stand behind proudly. You sort of look back on it and think, “Well, that was then, that was me then, and I didn’t realise the entirety of that book, that that’s who I actually was then, at the core.” Anyway, so—