I found writing novels rather a lonely business. You very rarely actually catch anyone reading them. I've heard of a novelist who got onto the tube at Piccadilly Circus for the purpose of getting out at Green Park, a distance of one stop. And as he got onto the tube he found himself sitting next to a girl who was in fact reading one of his novels. And he knew that two hundred pages further on there was a joke. So he sat on till Cockfosters, the end of the line, in the faint hope of hearing a laugh which never came.
John Mortimer, The Paris Review's "Art of Fiction" interview.
This raises some interesting questions:
a) How did the novelist end up in Cockfosters if he was on a westbound train?
b) Who on earth would take a tube from Piccadilly Circus to Green Park anyway?
c) Even allowing for the incompetence of London Underground, is there really enough time to read 200 pages on such a journey?
d) What lousy sort of novel contains a joke only after 200 pages?
Posted by: Witwoud | Saturday, January 27, 2007 at 05:20 PM
Ah, well spotted. It could be you've caught him out, but then again we'd better grant him some poetic licence. His anecdote about Sam Spiegel has a similar ring to it. A great story, though...
http://clivedavis.blogs.com/clive/2005/05/quotable_2.html
Posted by: Clive | Saturday, January 27, 2007 at 05:44 PM