Bad, Or Good, Or This?

Robert Bresson wrote: “Laugh at a bad reputation. Fear a good one that you could not sustain.”

I used to want a bad reputation… or a good one. The difference didn’t seem to matter. The first fictional character I ever identified with was Frankenstein’s Monster. Growing up, or trying to, in Maryhill, Glasgow, doing good or doing evil seemed equally valid to me, but being ignored, invisible, cast out, hungry, did not.

Now, ideas of bad or good seem less interesting t...