| 03 |
Is it true that you often put bits of yourself and your
own experiences into your characters? |
"Yes. In Second Skin there’s part of me
in several of the characters. Like the protagonist, Catherine, I live in the suburbs, but
feel somehow wrong in that milieu. I yearn to escape, break out, go wild! And like Will,
the poet, I wrote from a very early age and knew full well I wanted to be a writer, but I
was pressured by my father to get a ‘proper job’. And the job I took was in
advertising, like Nicky. I spent 12 years of my life doing something I hated, living a
sort of lie. And I was disturbed by the fact that I was also purveying lies - trying to
persuade people to buy products they probably didn’t need and which weren’t all
they were cracked up to be. "There's also a bit of me in Catherine’s daughter Kate, who challenges convention and wants time and space to find out what life’s all about. Even at the age of 58, I still feel adolescent in that sense." |
