Life can be too easy.

Life can be too easy

In a brief, on-line self-profile, David Mitchell, author of the highly original and acclaimed 'Cloud Atlas', writes about how and why he became a writer (as one must). Headed “Japan (where he lives) and my Writing” - spelt with double t, surprisingly enough – he links the explanations to the fact that, like Hemmingway and so many of 'us', he’s an expat.

“I knew I wanted to be a writer since I was a kid, but until I came to Japan to live in 1994 I was too easily distracted to do much about it. I would probably have become a writer wherever I lived, but would I have become the same writer if I'd spent the last 6 years in London, or Cape Town, or Moosejaw, on an oil rig or in the circus?” And then he goes on to answer his own question.

In my case I would answered the question based on the fact that, since1962, I have spent almost 28 years in countries other than England. Not that I’m boasting about my long, foreign-based track record. Far from it. I must also point out that being er, several years older than David Mitchell, I have a head start.

Having lived in the Netherlands for 17 of those years I am often criticised for not having immersed myself in either learning the Dutch language fluently, or knowing (or caring) about the nuances of Dutch society. As for Dutch cuisine…What I do know is that I came to Holland to write and, importantly, I had chosen Holland for reasons of financial security. Nothing more. Nothing less.

“In Japan,” Mitchell wrote, “I am, in writer/critic Donald Richie's phrase, an alien amongst natives.” Later, “This lack of belonging encourages me to write: I lack a sense of citizenship in the real world, and in some ways, commitment to it…To date, many of my characters show the same trait. My life…is stripped down. Two reasons: firstly, my ability to read (Japanese)…is roughly on par with a 10 year-old. I get by…If it weren't for my girlfriend I wouldn't know a 'typhoon' was coming until a 'pylon' flew past my window…”

In my case, substitute ‘haring’ and ‘stink’ (just kidding, Johan!) Other than that I agree with every word.

In the final paragraph he writes, “Although my ideal future as a novelist is one of reinvention, and although I won't be in this place for good, I think this place will be in me for good.”

David Mitchell writes in Japan; sometimes about Japan. And I can relate to how he must feel about living and writing in what I suppose to be, a land of intense, vivid and endless fascination.

This is where we differ. I chose the Netherlands. Neither ‘intense’, ‘vivid’ or ‘fascination’ came come into it. As for ‘endless’…Having now written two, as yet unsuccessful ‘original’ novels since I’ve been here, it seems that my choice of country in which to write, based on sound financial security, might betray my lack of understanding of what it takes to become a successful writer. Then again, only time will tell.

Cloud Atlas is not a new book but is timeless. It's quite a read and going back to it after a while is recommended. Six, sometimes obscurely linked, stories over a vast time scale, and the shift from story to story, is challenging; as are the differing uses of the stylised English that Mitchell chooses to write them in. The end of the book found me reaching for my World Atlas and my Oxford Reference Dictionary - which can’t be a bad thing – and confirmed that my distrust of medical practitioners is more than justified.

There is an extremely detailed summary (and critique) of the book by A.S. Byatt at, http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2004/mar/06/fiction.asbyatt, which says a hell of a lot more about it than I could ever have worked out or even imagined.