‘Books are traps.’ But how are they so, and whom do they trap: the author or the reader? Perhaps they are just the boasts of vainglorious minds, and what we hold up as literature is in fact a cult of unlikable characters. I hate to think they are like a fishing weir to the swimming mind, a trap easily swum into but rarely escaped: a neurosis, a dogma, a dream. No, no, I must not be so cynical! If books are traps, then let them be like terrariums: sealed up and still living miniatures of the world.
