When I See Films Made From Books,

I Half Closed My Eyes And Imagined This Was The Spot Where Everything I'd Ever Lost Since My Childhood Had Washed Up, And I Was Now Standing Here In Front Of It, And If I Waited Long Enough, A Tiny Figure Would Appear On The Horizon Across The Field And Gradually Get Larger Until I'd See It Was Tommy, And He'd Wave, And Maybe Even Call.

People Were Incredibly Kind To Our Family And Went Out Of Their Way To Help.

I Loved Cowboy Films And Tv Series, And I Learned Bits Of English From Them. My Favorite Was 'laramie', With Robert Fuller And John Smith. I Used To Watch 'the Lone Ranger', Which Had Been Famous In Japan As Well. I Idolized These Cowboys.

I Actually Dislike, More Than Many People, Working Through Literary Allusion. I Just Feel That There's Something A Bit Snobbish Or Elitist About That. I Don't Like It As A Reader, When I'm Reading Something. It's Not Just The Elitism Of It; It Jolts Me Out Of The Mode In Which I'm Reading. I've Immersed Myself In The World And Then When The Light Goes On I'm Supposed To Be Making Some Kind Of Literary Comparison To Another Text. I Find I'm Pulled Out Of My Kind Of Fictional World, I'm Asked To Use My Brain In A Different Kind Of Way. I Don't Like That.

I Was Very Young When I Prepared Those Prints. I Suspect The Reason I Couldn't Celebrate The Floating World Was That I Couldn't Bring Myself To Believe In Its Worth. Young Men Are Often Guilt-ridden About Pleasure, And I Suppose I Was No Different. I Suppose I Thought That To Pass Away One's Time In Such Places, To Spend One's Skills Celebrating Things So Intangible And Transient, I Suppose I Thought It All Rather Wasteful, All Rather Decadent. It's Hard To Appreciate The Beauty Of A World When One Doubts Its Very Validity