'It's why novelists write'

 

“There are many reasons why novelists write, but they all have one thing in common - a need to create an alternative world.” – John Fowles

 

Born in England on this date in 1926, Fowles wrote many thoughtful and thought-provoking things about the profession of writing, even though the writing world wasn’t his first career choice.  Fowles set out to be a teacher, taking a job at a small school in Greece that later became the setting for his book The Magus.  Even though he had that novel ready to go in 1960, he held off trying to get it published in order to finish a second manuscript called The Collector.  It was a “second” first novel that would establish his international reputation as a major writer. 

 

Published in 1963, The Collector went on to a massive release, noted by the publisher as "probably the highest price that had hitherto been paid for a first novel.”  By 1965 it also had been made into a nail-biting movie. 

 

With his reputation established, he then published The Magus, which was a moderate hit, and followed them both with his blockbuster The French Lieutenant's Woman.  Released to critical and popular success, it was eventually translated into a dozen languages and adapted as a feature film starring Meryl Streep and Jeremy Irons.  

 

In his lifetime he published 19 books and while fiction was his forte’, he also was a noted essayist, taught English as a foreign language to immigrant children, and earned further accolades as a poet – something he said should not be considered unusual.    

 

“We all write poems,” he noted.  “It is simply that real poets are the ones who write in words.”