Cirrus@Austlit

'When I arrived at the University of California at Santa Barbara to teach creative writing, I had no idea of how to go about it. I had my own experience of writing novels and stories. But how was that to be translated into teaching practice? I tentatively asked some of the staff there how they did it. ‘Oh, we were hoping you would be able to tell us,’ said Edgar Bowers. He was a poet whose most recent collection was called Living Together. That was the title of my first novel. I think we viewed each other with some suspicion about this coincidence. But he did offer me one piece of advice. ‘I tell them they can write anything they like, as long as it’s not science fiction or about death.’ After that I was plunged into it.' (Introduction)