Writing On Literature

Questions  for Andrew Cowan on the novel Crustaceans by Kouhei Furuya, Yuko Kato, Jun Ohashi, and Takuya Osada. Part 2 Tokyo University, 7 December 2003 First of all, many thanks for your generous response to our previous interview.  Your answers were very helpful and informative, we felt, though with one exception.  It was hard to understand your method of writing. As well as writing and revising each line, do you come back later and revise every line again?  Once you decide on the nature of Euan’s accident, for example, there is clear foreshadowing earlier on.  Why bother with so much earlier revision if you have to come back and revise again later? On the whole, I don’t come back and

Questions  for Andrew Cowan on the novel Crustaceans by Kouhei Furuya, Eri Higuchi, Yuko Kato, Jun Ohashi, Akira Ohkubo, and Takuya Osada. Tokyo University, 6 November 2003 Your book, Pig, was a story about a pig. The word 'crustacean' is quite difficult, unfamiliar, and were you not afraid that the readers will find it difficult to imagine that this novel is about a father-son relationship with this title? Have you ever thought of having another title? No, this was always going to be the title. It has three kinds of resonance for me.  1.  It's a word of private significance for Paul, because it's the first word he imagines teaching his new-born son.  2.  It has seaside connotations. 3. It