October 3rd, 1998

The best part of life, I think, is trying to figure out how things work. Not only in the smooth pavement of rationality, but also in the beaten tracks of the subconscious. And while most people have a firm leaning towards one or the other, the simple truth of the matter is that they have a little bit of the both stuffed in them. That's the purpose of a job, you see - to make you a little fixed, a little rooted in society, but at the same time, to give you a taste of the deeper side. That's why a good lawyer can turn the slightest mannerism into a potential weapon; he's figured out the intimate reaches of psychology, and he knows when to use it in his favor. That's why a movie director can deliver a sense of time, space and tragedy to an audience he knows is out there; he's part of that audience, and at the same time, part puppeteer behind the curtain. It's this dualism, this process of action and reaction, which gives us immediate glimmers into ourselves.

I've worked as an actor. I've been a mime. I know how to work lights on a set. I've been behind a camera when the scene started rolling, I've sweated my blood and tears into a piece of literature. I've studied psychology, theology, economics and history. I can twist an audience with just an inflection of my voice. I can tell you what it feels like to sing on-stage in the Opera House, what it feels like to clear an obstacle on a horse's back, what it feels like to be surrounded by a thousand raggedy teeth of earth with only a bobbing sail yacht to keep you company. I can look at a stranger and permutate any one of a hundred different subconscious gestures into a new story. But you know what? All that doesn't count a lick in the end. I probably understand as much about another human being now - with the benefit of all those skills - as I do about feminism.

There's an extra layer of irony there too. If we can't ever be sure we know other people, how well do we know ourselves? My greater insight into my motivations and desires are counterbalanced by my lack of perspective, my lack of distance. What is brought to the equation with one hand is taken away equally from the other.

I don't remember everything that's influenced my life, but I do remember this - a good deal of the important things, I learnt through books. And lest you should scoff and tell me books are for the insecure, I'll remind you that they are nothing if not the life stories of other people. Robert R. McCammon wrote, 'every time an old man dies, a small library dies with him.' There's truth enough in that.

In particular, two books that I have read in my life changed it profoundly.

I encountered the first one five years ago, in the sweltering humidity of an English classroom. It was a thin, almost beat up paperback copy of John Knowles' A Separate Peace. At the tender age of thirteen, it showed me that friendship was not always the shining golden arch we wished it to be. Sometimes, it was more a creation of love, loyalty, respect, admiration, jealousy, hatred and guilt. Knowles' stirring portrayal made me see the value in imperfection, and in childhood.

The second book I had actually read a year beforehand, in what seemed like another age. Whereas A Separate Peace had moved me to visible change, this story swam quietly beneath the surface of my thoughts. This one I had taken down from the impenetrable reams of a library shelf. It was undoubtedly an adult's book, yet I checked it out anyway, lured by the promise of voodoo priestesses and giant crocodiles and cyclopian bikes. I thought I was ready for it, but I was wrong. The book had been crafted for eyes and hands far older - and yet younger - than mine. Without fully understanding this trouble, I finished the last pages. The part of me that had felt kinship with the book, dimmed and fell asleep in that instant. I returned the book to the library.

Six years later, it's my brother who faces the journey of being twelve. With half-remembered joy, I went searching for the same tome that had emblazoned itself on me at the same tender age. I found it yesterday - a glossy hardback edition that I bought and devoured almost upon the spot. And this time I was amazed to find that I could fully appreciate its subtle vibes, its lamentations and ironies, its many humurous points. I had grown young and old again in six years. I could see in its undulating words, faint echoes of Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird and Twain's The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. The imaginary muses had drawn out the very best of a considerable talent and put it in Robert R. McCammon's Boy's Life. It chilled me to think of such greatness. I saw myself in Cory's dreams, in Nemo's upflung ball, in Vernon's childish ways. Most of all, I saw my own life in Zephyr.

There are plenty of other books that I love, for sure - things as great and wonderful as David Gemmell's Lion of Macedon and Morningstar; things as finely crafted as Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness, as provocative as Henrik Ibsen's A Doll's House, as powerful as James Clavell's Taipan; things as sweet and painful as Dan Simmon's Remembering Siri and as haunting as Ursula Le Guin's Wizard of Earthsea. But the first book I will ever give my brother in the hopes that he learns something from it, will be Boy's Life. Who knows? Maybe lightning can strike twice.