Many years, I would publish four books - an anthology, a book of criticism, a new book of poems, a book of essays.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
I write for the love of writing. If I never published another book, I would still be writing stories.
In 1971, when I was 29, I wrote my first volume of poetry. I am a poet, and I have published four books of my poems.
I've always written. At the age of six or seven, I would get sheets of A4 paper and fold them in half, cut the edges to make a little eight-page booklet, break it up into squares and put in little stick men with little speech bubbles, and I'd have a spy story, a space story and a football story.
I've written 18 books, mostly dealing with issues of social justice, ending racism, feminism, and cultural criticism.
I don't think I'd have the stamina, skill or ability to write a novel, but I'd love to write short stories and poetry, because those are my two passions.
For about twenty years, if I managed to write ten or twelve poems in a year; I considered that a pretty successful year, but I wrote 'The Beforelife' within a year.
I'd go to a bookstore, and I'd flip through flap copy, and I'd think, 'If this gal can get published, I can get published.'
Write a lot and don't think about publishing - just the writing.
I have many books that I want to write; I'd like to think that I'll be around for another 20 years or so and write another dozen novels, probably some sort of imaginative literature... Never again another seven-volume saga.
I wrote about four novels before I wrote a word of journalism.