In his final year at UEA, 1994/5, Malcolm Bradbury chaired the pre-Christmas seminars of the MA in Creative Writing. Over eight weeks, the students had one three-hour seminar a week. In total, then, a sum of twenty-four hours with Professor Bradbury. From the first, he looked immensely tired. He’d seen all our types before, must have done, and as he checked us over I imagined him hoping that this year, after so many other years, no-one in a black polo neck or steel-rimmed glasses was going to be chasing him down corridors in the hunt for publishers’ numbers. No luck, Malcolm. Of course he was chased down corridors, and was patient and helpful and charming, or expertly evasive, which possibly