For Me, Literature Is A Way Of

When I Walk Into An Apartment With Books On The Shelves, Books On The Bedside Tables, Books On The Floor, And Books On The Toilet Tank, Then I Know What I Would See If I Opened The Door That Says Private - Grownups Keep Out: A Children Sprawled On The Bed, Reading.

Something Amazing Happens When The Rest Of The World Is Sleeping. I Am Glued To My Chair. I Forget That I Ever Wanted To Do Anything But Write. The Crowded City, The Crowded Apartment, And The Crowded Calendar Suddenly Seem Spacious. Three Or Four Hours Pass In A Moment; I Have No Idea What Time It Is, Because I Never Check The Clock. If I Chose To Listen, I Could Hear The Swish Of Taxis Bound For Downtown Bars Or The Soft Saxophone Riffs That Drift From A Neighbor's Window, But Nothing Gets Through. I Am Suspended In A Sensory Deprivation Tank, And The Very Lack Of Sensation Is Delicious.

When The Irish Novelist John Mcgahern Was A Child, His Sisters Unlaced And Removed One Of His Shoes While He Was Reading. He Did Not Stir. They Placed A Straw Hat On His Head. No Response. Only When They Took Away The Wooden Chair On Which He Was Sitting Did He, As He Puts It, 'wake Out Of The Book'.

Books Wrote Our Life Story, And As They Accumulated On Our Shelves (and On Our Windowsills, And Underneath Our Sofa, And On Top Of Our Refrigerator), They Became Chapters In It Themselves.

I Can Think Of Few Better Ways To Introduce A Child To Books Than To Let Her Stack Them, Upend Them, Rearrange Them, And Get Her Fingerprints All Over Them.