They are not only dense with arguments about everything from the pointlessness of modernist despair to the question of free will, but are also filled with references to fictions past. But while you can control what you choose to write about to a degree, I think that under that fairly secure adult consciouness of where you're going there's also a kind of childlike, unconscious cycle going on. This state of mind is nurtured by his hermetic, isolated life. For 15 years, he and his wife, Elizabeth, have lived in Lyme Regis, a tiny English seaside resort. I think, explore inward if you lead a busy public life.
Writers are basically egotists.
This introspection, Mr. Fowles says, was acquired, in part, as a kind of willful rebellion against his own conventional youth. That persona,'' he said, ''that mask I wore, was never really me, and I think I did it because like so many young British children I was brainwashed into the system. I was told I was not fit material to be an officer. It was a great shock, but it was also very useful because underneath I hated that whole ethos. He has nearly completed a draft of his next book, another historical novel.