My Novel: Portrait Of A Doukhobor As A Young Man

“A man's errors are his portals of discovery.” - James Joyce

It's been a hell of a long struggle to get this far and I've probably got 10 more drafts to go before it's published, but it's an awesome feeling to have arrived, nevertheless. To quote a phrase - I don't like to talk about a present work - it spoils something at the root of the creative act and discharges the tension. But in short, it's based on the life and death of my uncle Harry, a Sons of Freedom Doukhobor.


Have you ever given birth? How about written a novel? I know it's a cliché, but I'm sure I've succeeded in coming the closest a man can come to delivering a newborn baby. I just finished the first draft after working on it non-stop for the past 2 years.


As George Orwell wrote in his essay, Why I Write, "Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand."

Ridonkulous.