A Slip of the Keyboard Collected Nonfiction

I’m all for assisted death. Of course there are people who are against it, but they come up with the wrong reasons, such as “God doesn’t like it” and so on. Personally, I really don’t think God is all that bothered, but I would like to think that my god would be more concerned about unnecessary suffering. Who knows.

It occurred to me that at one point it was like I had two diseases—one was Alzheimer’s and the other was knowing I had Alzheimer’s.

For what it’s worth, I always preferred Batman. Most local kids did. If you ate up your broccoli and drank your milk you could theoretically be Batman when you grew up, whereas in order to be Superman you had to be born on another planet.

In any case, genre is just a flavouring. It’s not the whole meal. Don’t get confused by the scenery.

Do I still think, as I did then, that Tolkien was the greatest writer in the world? In the strict sense, no. You can think that at thirteen. If you still think it at fifty-three, something has gone wrong with your life. But sometimes things all come together at the right time in the right place—book, author, style, subject, and reader. The moment was magic.

Most crime novels are full of policemen, crimes, and criminals, and most cakes contain pretty much the same sort of ingredients. It’s the cookery that counts. Cook it right, with imagination and flair and a good pinch of luck, and you have that rare and valuable thing—a genre book that’s risen above the genre. And Harry Potter is beautifully cooked.

I also came across the word neoteny, which means “remaining young.” It’s something which we as humans have developed into a survival trait.

As a suddenly thirsting reader I escaped first of all to what was then called Outer Space. I read a lot of science fiction, which as I have said is only a twentieth-century subset of fantasy. And a lot of it was, in strict literary terms, rubbish. But this was good rubbish. It was like an exercise bicycle for the mind—it doesn’t take you anywhere, but it certainly tones up the muscles.

There’s a feeling that I think is only possible to get when you are a child and discover books: it’s a kind of fizz—you want to read everything that’s in print before it evaporates before your eyes.

Sorceress? Just a better class of witch. Enchantress? Just a witch with good legs. The fantasy world, in fact, is overdue for a visit from the Equal Opportunities people because, in the fantasy world, magic done by women is usually of poor quality, third-rate, negative stuff, while the wizards are usually cerebral, clever, powerful, and wise.

Strangely enough, that’s also the case in this world. You don’t have to believe in magic to notice that.

I can’t stress that last point enough. Fantasy works best when you take it seriously (it can also become a lot funnier, but that’s another story). Taking it seriously means that there must be rules. If anything can happen, then there is no real suspense.

… well, when I was young, I wrote a letter to J. R. R. Tolkien, just as he was becoming extravagantly famous.

I just said I’d enjoyed the book very much. And he said thank you. For a moment, it achieved the most basic and treasured of human communications: you are real, and therefore so am I.

And so I’ve been learning as I go, and I find it now rather embarrassing that people beginning the Discworld series start with The Colour of Magic and The Light Fantastic, which I don’t think are some of the best books to start with. This is the author saying this, folks. Do not start at the beginning with Discworld.

But horizontal wealth means not letting your increased income dictate your tastes. You like books and now you have money? Buy more books!

Where do the ideas come from? I do not know. But one of the things I did learn from my science fiction reading was that there were other things you could read besides science fiction.

People are magnificent research, almost the best there is.

Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable is the first book to turn to when questions arise and the final desperate volume when the lesser reference books have failed. No bookshelf, no WORLD is complete without it. It’s as simple as that.

SUSURRATION

… from the Latin susurrus, “whisper” or “rustling,” which is exactly what it sounds like. It’s a hushed noise. But it hints of plots and secrets and people turning to one another in surprise. It’s the noise, in fact, made just after the sword is withdrawn from the stone and just before the cheering starts.