Page 153 - And the Mountains Echoed (novel)

NW: A thorny question, that one. I suppose I would answer in

the affirmative, if only I could keep them apart from the
creative process itself.

EB: You mean separate the end from the means.

NW: I see the creative process as a necessarily thievish
undertaking. Dig beneath a beautiful piece of writing,
Monsieur Boustouler, and you will find all manner of
dishonor. Creating means vandalizing the lives of other
people, turning them into unwilling and unwitting
participants. You steal their desires, their dreams, pocket
their flaws, their suffering. You take what does not belong to
you. You do this knowingly.

EB: And you were very good at it.

NW: I did it not for the sake of some high and lofty notion
about art but because I had no choice. The compulsion was
far too powerful. If I did not surrender to it, I would have lost
my mind. You ask if I am proud. I find it hard to flaunt
something obtained through what I know to be morally
questionable means. I leave the decision to tout or not to
others.

She empties her glass of wine and refills it with what remains
in the bottle.

NW: What I can tell you, however, is that no one was touting
me in Kabul. No one in Kabul considered me a pioneer of
anything but bad taste, debauchery, and immoral character.
Not least of all, my father. He said my writings were the
ramblings of a whore. He used that word precisely. He said
I’d damaged his family name beyond repair. He said I had
betrayed him. He kept asking why I found it so hard to be
respectable.

EB: How did you respond?