5/13/2023 0 Comments Barbara kingsolver monarchsIt’s less entertaining than some of the others, but has the distinction of being true. For that reason, as a supplement to the other versions that are now in the world, I provide here my own version of the Barbara Kingsolver story. I’ve also learned, the hard way, that Wikipedia abhors a vacuum: others gladly fill in the biographical details I decline to offer myself. Yet I understand that for many people, art inspires curiosity about the artist. I do not believe this information improves the understanding of my books, in any way I offer the world my books, which stand on their own without explanation, and never imagine the details of my personal life should interest anyone but friends and family. I’ve never written anything in that line. Among the worst things I commonly heard people say about a woman, in my childhood, was that she was “parading herself around.” This may explain why I’m happy to put a three-pound novel into the hands of anyone inclined to heft it, but squeamish about autobiography. Prolonged self-revelation seems discourteous to me, and self-aggrandizing is vulgar. In the culture in which I was raised, it was considered charming to tell long, entertaining stories about peculiar relatives or a runaway hog or anything under the sun-except yourself.
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