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[MUSIC PLAYING]

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What are novels
if not stories?

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If all they were was ideas,
they wouldn't be novels.

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They would be
works of philosophy

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or something else like that,
but they would not be novels.

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And novels are
always about people,

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even if the people are rabbits.

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And "Watership
Down", it's a novel.

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And "Watership
Down", it's a novel.

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We have these characters.

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They're rabbits, but
really they're people.

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They have emotions like people.

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They have conversations
and they have activities

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that are people like.

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"Lord of the Rings", there
are some human beings in them,

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but the other characters are
talking trees or Nazguls,

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things like that.

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But essentially it's
characters in a story,

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and that's what a novel is.

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and that's what a novel is.

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The thing about the novel as a
form ever since it has appeared

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is that it's been
infinitely malleable.

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That is it's polymorphic.

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It's taken many forms.

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People are always coming up
with new theories of the novel

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or new theories of
new kinds of novel

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or doing things like writing
a novel in which the letter

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A does not appear.

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People are always pulling it
this way, pulling it that way,

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People are always pulling it
this way, pulling it that way,

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pulling it apart,
experimenting with it,

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declaring that it's dead.

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It's been such a shape
changer that we do not

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know what new form may emerge.

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And that is one of
the great things

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about this thing
we call the novel,

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namely long prose
narratives that

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are not medieval poetic epics
or whatever preceded them,

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the novel.

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They've all got
characters and events,

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They've all got
characters and events,

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and within that just about
anything has been possible.

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But the main rule is
hold my attention.

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[MUSIC PLAYING]

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What is the value of knowing
the genre or type of book you're

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writing before you start?

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Well, there may be a
value in not knowing.

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Well, there may be a
value in not knowing.

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And the value of
not knowing may be

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that you may be able to
do some genre bending

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that if you lock yourself
in to a preconceived box,

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you might not be able to do.

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What your job is is to make
your book whatever it may be,

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as plausible, as
believable as possible.

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If you can make us believe
in "Rosemary's Baby",

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it doesn't really matter what
shelf down the line somebody

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it doesn't really matter what
shelf down the line somebody

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is going to put you book on.

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It's more of a
requirement for people

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writing literary criticism than
it is for authors themselves.

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Your job as an author is
to make your book real.

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Literary fiction,
commercial fiction,

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these are decisions
made by publishers.

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So as an author,
your job remains

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So as an author,
your job remains

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to make your book as good a
book of its kind as it can be.

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So some editor then may
come across and say,

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this has really great
commercial possibilities.

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We're going to put a lot behind
this, major marketing campaign.

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That's not your decision.

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You have made your book the
best of its kind that it can be.

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And how it is
marketed, although you

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may scream and yell and protest
and say they haven't done

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may scream and yell and protest
and say they haven't done

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enough or they've done the wrong
thing or all the rest of it,

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those are not your decisions.

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Character-driven novels
and plot-driven novels,

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another false distinction.

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If you've made your book the
best book that it can be,

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it's going to have both.

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That is it's going to have both
people whose personalities we

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want to watch develop and it's
also going to have events in it

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want to watch develop and it's
also going to have events in it

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that we want to watch happen.

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We want to know what comes next.

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If there's nothing in
a book but characters--

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it could be a new piece
of post-postmodernism,

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but the audience will
probably be somewhat limited

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and possibly rather ephemeral.

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I don't know whether you
remember a French writer called

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Robbe-Grillet who was supposed
to be the new hot thing at one

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Robbe-Grillet who was supposed
to be the new hot thing at one

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point, and he decided to do
away with plot and characters.

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What was the result?

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Well, it was sort of like
reading about a cafeteria tray.

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There were objects.

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Those were a bit--

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how daring-- no
plot, no characters.

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How long did that last?

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Have you ever heard
of this person, you?

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No?

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Didn't think so.