In a fit of pique, I said to my agent, 'I'm going to write something you can sell.' The idea was to write a straight page-turner, with no literary conceits.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
While growing up, I always had to depend on foreign authors for page-turners. I think of myself as a commercial writer, and my job is simple to entertain you.
Agents and publishers only want one thing - good writing.
I was tired of illustration. You'd work so hard on a commission and it would go in to a magazine, and you'd turn the page and it was gone.
At the outset, my notion of being a writer was that you would have moments of inspiration and moments of frustration, when you'd crumple up your pages and toss them away. On one side, the dustbin would fill up, and on the other side, pages would rise into a novel.
Obviously, I like to write stories that are page-turners. But I always try my very, very hardest to be as factually true as possible.
My book sales make 'real writers' possible.
Of all fatiguing, futile, empty trades, the worst, I suppose, is writing about writing.
Write because you love the art and the discipline, not because you're looking to sell something.
But if I worried too much about publishers' expectations, I'd probably paralyze myself and not be able to write anything.
Possibly because I did start off as a journalist, my starting point has always been that you've got to keep an audience with you. Whatever you're doing, you always want a script to be a page-turner. It's very important never, ever, to feel above that.
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