Richard Flanagan

The great thing about writing is that it can be produced in sub-optimal—even atrocious—conditions. And so many of the most interesting books are. It’s the one art form that isn’t beholden to power or money. Which is perhaps why so much of what we celebrate in writing comes from the edges—geographically, politically, socially, economically. What a writer needs above all is a mad courage to overcome the fear of failure we all have, which is also, unfortunately, often also the most destructive vanity. The reader wins in this, and mostly the writer gains little or loses most things or even everything. Their grail is that they will make something beautiful and very occasionally enduring, and, of course, they almost never get there. But how wonderful that they keep trying.

RICHARD FLANAGAN