A fundamental condition of creation...?

[PJS]

I have not read Jonathan Littell’s The Kindly Ones, nor (considering its theme) am I liable to. Still, the thing has won major literary awards, starting with Prix Goncourt, and most recently the Athens Prize. Littell, now with a global reputation and more publishers’ advances than most writers could even count, apparently is too busy – writing a new door-stop, counting his euros, whatever – to show up and accept the Athens Prize. On the other hand – there is always another hand, be it ever so shrivelled and limp – it may be that Littell really believes what he wrote to the jury of the Athens Prize:

It has always been my view that literature is a very private matter now, and that what takes place between a writer and his work belongs to a sphere utterly separate from the interaction of that work with those who read it, comment it, praise it or damn it. Privacy, for me, is a fundamental condition of creation, of work.

To be fair, here’s a link to the full text of the letter.
http://is.gd/1gYt3

ps