On writing and illness

Reading Arthur W. Frank’s astonishing At the Will of the Body recently has given me pause to reflect on the relationship … More

Murdering my darling

I have murdered my darling. Like a bird of a certain blue vintage, it is ex, dead, kaput, finished. The … More

My first reader was a man called Fergus. A friend of a flatmate at university, I never got to … More

Cut through to what happens when you listen. Cut through to making it happen, listening for it, failing, then doing … More

Dear Ant Looking forward to 2015 it’s tempting to think it will never reach the heights of 2014. Big mistake. Huge. … More

I am at a thing. A historic thing. (An historic thing? I will never know). Poets are there. Household names. … More

In 1991 we moved to a house in Brixton, south London. Of all our welcomes, that of our neighbour, the … More

Someone who knows me very well knocked me sideways with a comment the other day. Remarking on this blog, … More

I am driving to a thing. Not a famous thing, an out of the way thing. A classroom, perhaps. … More

I am not at a thing. The things have dried up (or I have stopped going). I am thingless. I … More

You think it will be about your childhood. It turns out to be about an onion. Or a night in … More

For now, at least, it has gone. The notebooks with promising phrases, the backs of envelopes with doodles: they are … More

I have finished the thing. People come up to me to say things. It seems to have gone well. While … More

I am in the pub with Rupert. We are talking about planning a thing. It’s definitely going to happen. A … More

I am at a thing. It is my thing, contributing to the thing of others, who I do not know. … More

I met the furniture designer Duncan Kramer at summer camp. Not as kids but as what we laughingly called leaders. … More

The book is not in love with me. I shower it with love and promises of more stationery, but all … More

I have not read a book in six months -Raymond Carver, ‘Drinking While Driving’ I can still remember the shock … More