'I was attracted to The Green Bell by the part that the poet Michael Dransfield has in it. He was a symbolic figure of the 1960s, representing the Dionysian and Bacchanal as against the ordered classical world of my studies and faith, with his raw and needlestrewn life and poetry and his photograph in a Franciscan cowl.' (Introduction)
'Three weeks ago I was sitting in the back of a Russian-built tank as it sliced its way through the tundra of Siberia's northern Yamal Peninsula. I was part of an expedition north of Salekhard, the only city in the world to straddle the Arctic Circle's 66th parallel, to a camp where the nomadic reindeer herders known as Nenet had set up their chums, or tents. We had already been driving for many long hours, and now we were faced by a rising river that had to somehow be crossed if we were to make our way back to Salekhard and then across Russia's vast interior to Moscow, by train, and then, finally, home.' (Introduction)
'A little over a year ago, Lionel Shriver delivered the opening address at the Brisbane 'Writers Festival, where she notoriously derided political correctness and defended the practice of cultural appropriation by white writers. A little over a year ago, I wrote a blog post responding to what she'd said. I wrote it while I was walking to the train station, while I was on the train, and while I was walking home from the train station. I was angry, but I somehow managed to temper my anger.' (Introduction)
