My books are elegiac in the sense that they're odes to a nation that even I sometimes think may not exist anymore except in my memory and my imagination.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
With each book I write, I become more and more convinced that the books have a life of their own, quite apart from me.
So, whenever I'm writing, I'm writing in the presence of all the other books I've read and I think we all are.
I try not to recommend too many books, frankly, because I think there's a certain synchronicity that happens when people discover books.
I myself owe everything to French books. They developed in my soul the sentiments of humanity which had been stifled by eight years of fanatical and servile education.
The things I keep going back to, rereading, maybe they say more about me as a reader than about the books. Love in the Time of Cholera, Pale Fire.
My books are, in a way, a record of my life - that part of it that came to flower and fruit in my mind.
All my books are adventures, but they also have a social viewpoint.
I don't live in books, but, boy, have books amplified my life.
My books are just pure escapism for kids.
I read just endlessly, ceaselessly, almost every book, it seems!