And As He Spoke, I Was Thinking,

You Asked If I Thought My Fiction Had Changed Anything In The Culture And The Answer Is No. Sure, There's Been Some Scandal, But People Are Scandalized All The Time; It's A Way Of Life For Them. It Doesn't Mean A Thing. If You Ask If I Want My Fiction To Change Anything In The Culture, The Answer Is Still No. What I Want Is To Possess My Readers While They Are Reading My Book — If I Can, To Possess Them In Ways That Other Writers Don't. Then Let Them Return, Just As They Were, To A World Where Everybody Else Is Working To Change, Persuade, Tempt, And Control Them.

I Know I'm Not Going To Write As Well As I Used To. I No Longer Have The Stamina To Endure The Frustration. Writing Is Frustration - It's Daily Frustration, Not To Mention Humiliation.

We Leave A Stain, We Leave A Trail, We Leave Our Imprint. Impurity, Cruelty, Abuse, Error, Excrement, Semen - There’s No Other Way To Be Here. Nothing To Do With Disobedience. Nothing To Do With Grace Or Salvation Or Redemption. It’s In Everyone. Indwelling. Inherent. Defining. The Stain That Is There Before Its Mark.

All I Can Tell You With Certainty Is That I, For One, Have No Self, And That I Am Unwilling Or Unable To Perpetrate Upon Myself The Joke Of A Self. What I Have Instead Is A Variety Of Impersonations I Can Do, And Not Only Of Myself - A Troupe Of Players That I Have Internalised, A Permanent Company Of Actors That I Can Call Upon When A Self Is Required. I Am A Theater And Nothing More Than A Theater.

There Is Truth And Then Again There Is Truth. For All That The World Is Full Of People Who Go Around Believing They've Got You Or Your Neighbor Figured Out, There Really Is No Bottom To What Is Not Known. The Truth About Us Is Endless. As Are The Lies.