I was standing in the library the other day, taking down book after book, reading the blurb, getting a taste of the contents, when I suddenly felt as if I were an astronaut. There I was on Starship Me, cruising the space between the shelves, and each book was a planet, containing its own distinct world, its own life forms, its own births, deaths and adventures. Which one would I visit? Which would I briefly colonise? Which would add to my knowledge of the universe and help me learn more about my place in it? Or which would repel me and punish me for having tried to introduce myself to its alien population?
This is when I realised what a responsibility authors have. What an impact they can have on the minds of others. What wonderful worlds they can create, or what bleak hells, what penal asteroids, what gardens of delights. In future, perhaps I shall steer Starship Me more carefully - or maybe I shall venture into hitherto unexplored galaxies such as the Philosophy or Biography sections and emerge refuelled and with my mind expanded. Or retreat with my starship and self-esteem dented, having discovered what a tiny life-form I am in this vast and ever expanding universe of Literature.
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