


And then I begin the long process of disengaging.”įor Tartt’s fans, disengaging from her books is almost impossible, and all the more so because, so far, she publishes just once every decade and disappears in between. I have my own ideas, but once the book is out there it’s not really mine anymore, and my own idea isn’t any more valid than yours. So the characters in your copy of the book are going to look and sound different than in mine. The reader is bringing his or her own memories, intelligence, preconceptions, prejudices, likes, dislikes.

As a writer I’m giving the reader signs to help create the story with me. Readers really participate in the writing of a book. “I don’t think it’s a good idea for a writer to psychoanalyze herself or try to explain why she writes what she writes-it’s a reductive way of looking at oneself and one’s work. The key to her books, she insists, can’t be found in her, anyway.
