It was Tip O’Neill, the former Speaker of the House, who once said that all politics is local. With apologies to old Tip, I will go one step further. All politics is personal.

Whatever one’s political preferences, who cannot admire Barack Obama’s verve, spirit, and oratorical skills? But the words of his pastor, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, who Obama has revered and trumpeted as his inspiration and spiritual advisor, make one shudder with embarrassment for the candidate even as he attempts to override, excuse, justify, and separate himself from the pastor’s hateful rhetoric while avowing his solidarity with the Reverend.

As for me, my reaction is visceral, complicated, entangled with my life’s experiences and, therefore, deeply personal, just as Obama’s reaction was deeply personal. Of course, I am not running for President and my voice is a tiny whisper compared to his. But I treasure my one vote and my reaction means just as much to me as Obama’s reaction means to him.…

Read more: All Politics is Personal

Dutch
By Edmund Morris
Random House, 1999

Edmund Morris, who won the Pulitzer Prize in 1980 for his life of Theodore Roosevelt, was for his next book given unusual access to Ronald Reagan. Morris later admitted that he was baffled by the president, and the result was this somewhat bizarre “biography.” Reagan, I believe, was far more nuanced and subtle than the media ever grasped. Although Morris might have glimpsed the power and ambition behind the mask, I suspect that he knew he couldn’t quite harvest the man’s essence. Thus he attempted to get at the Reagan story in an unusual way, creating a kind of Greek chorus and introducing himself as a fictional character in the narrative. He was naturally excoriated by critics and the Reagan family, but even though Dutch may be dubious as a nonfiction work, it is insightful and deeply compelling.

Ten North Frederick
By John O’Hara
Random House, 1955

It never ceases to amaze me how much obscene enjoyment modern critics get out of pummeling the work of John O’Hara.…

Read more: Five Best: A novelist picks his favorite works about ambition, political or otherwise

2. How did you get your first novel published?

Every published writer will tell a different story. Some will laud their agent for “recognizing their talent” and fighting for its publication. Others will cite a perceptive editor (perceptive in that he or she chose the writer’s work for publication.) Some will cite contacts or connections and networking. In today’s world where technology has made it almost respectable to self-publish, writers will tell other stories.

Here is my story.

I was over forty years old. I had a young family to support. My writing skills enabled me to set up my own Advertising and Public Relations agency in Washington D.C. I bought radio stations. I put a television station on the air in a small market, Hagerstown, Maryland. Yet, money aside, I considered myself a failure, a traitor to my calling.

I continued to write my novels and short stories before going to work, but I could not get them published.…

Read more: People are always asking me two questions (Part Two)

People are always asking me two questions:

1. How and why did I become a writer?
2. How did I get my first novel published?

Although these questions appear, at first, to be simple and straightforward they are far more complex than they appear. Writers and readers are forewarned, my answers will satisfy few and probably lead to more and more questions. Nevertheless, after a lifetime in the writing game, I guess I should give the answers a college try.

1. How and why did I become a writer?

The term writer is enormously imprecise. I define myself primarily as a writer of the imagination, a story teller, a fantasizer. Some describe such work as “creative writing.” My principal medium is the novel and the short story and, occasionally, the stage play, poetry and lyrics. Although I have been a journalist, reporter and essayist, these pursuits are peripheral to my main occupation.…

Read more: People are always asking me two questions (Part One)