Just As The People Who Lived Through

I Blush Easily. I Have Difficulty Meeting People's Eye, Difficulty With Public Speaking, The Normal Afflictions Of The Shy, But Not To A Paralysing Degree.

I Really Practiced Hard And Got To A Certain Level Of Technical Proficiency. I Overcame Some Of My Limitations. I Was A Hard-working, Dedicated Bassoonist, But I Have To Say I'm Not A Natural Musician.

As Soon As You Start Doing That - Changing Things - It Seems Self-evident To Me That You've Entered The World Of Make-believe. If You Pretend That It's True, And Use Your Own Name, You Are Misleading People. Fiction Is Looser And Wilder And Sometimes In The End More Self-revealing, Anyway.

Maybe The Kindle Was The Bowflex Of Bookishness: Something Expensive That, When You Commit To It, Forces You To Do More Of Whatever It Is You Think You Should Be Doing More Of.

Updike Was The First To Take The Penile Sensorium Under The Wing Of Elaborate Metaphorical Prose.