We could not write as they did. The contemporary dissatisfaction with modern literature is borne partly out of the unsurpassable magnificence of our inherited literary traditions. It serves as a warning to mankind, as does Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman , a tragic portrayal of the still more disastrous American Dream. Just as these books first outraged and then became popularised, so radical works of the new millennium will gradually imprint themselves upon a society, until an author's name can be forever linked with a play or novel. Jostein Gaarder will always be the writer of Sophie's World , Roald Dahl the man who created such fantastic stores as The BFG and Helen Fielding the witty author of Bridget Jones .
All writers have one thing in common, and that is daring.
A blind confidence in their own abilities which renders everything else meaningless-that excludes all time. I hope that it is unnecessary to delve into the possibilities of time and space to further contemplate the future of books. Technology will expand in ever greater proportions - this is certain. Mankind shall return time after time to the novels of his present and his past because they represent what he innately knows best. One day, the computer will have history on its side, but not before the more celebrated anniversary of the book.