'And this is me'

Emotion is something of which some writers are wary, preferring to produce work without revealing too much of themselves.

However, for many other writers, there cannot be fiction without a sense of themselves in it. For some authors, there is always part of them peering through, their fears, their hopes, their aspirations, their take on life. They may not say ‘and this is me’ but it is there all the same.

For many authors, writing has to be a deeply personal art. That was certainly the agreement when some of students discussed the issue the other night. ‘Writing comes from life,’ they concluded.

Of course, it is not all autobiographical - many writers write characters and scenes which readers find abhorrent and use language and ideas with which readers might not agree but which need to be there because they reflect the world about us.

However, in there somewhere are also tantalising glimpses of what the writer really thinks of the world.