For instance: Alex Garland (who’d then recently published The Beach) and I began a pattern—still continuing today—of meeting for rambling, informal lunches in North London cafés, and I soon noticed how he, without self-consciousness or posturing, often cited writers like J.G. Ballard, Ursula K. Le Guin, and John Wyndham. It was Alex who drew up for me a list of the most important graphic novels I had to read, introducing me to the work of important figures like Alan Moore and Grant Morrison. Alex was at that time writing a screenplay that would become the classic 2002 zombie dystopia film 28 Days Later. He showed me an early draft and I listened in fascination to him discussing the pros and cons of various ways forward.
Had no idea he was friends with Alex Garland what a small world. Also loved how he still loved to learn even as he grew older from younger writers. Lastly loved the insight into his meticulousness when deciding a narrator for the novel. This quote got me though.
Aside from its simple elegance, what struck me about this title was the sheer impossibility of what was being requested. “Please hold me for a long time” would be reasonable. But if someone pleads “Never let me go,” they’re not only asking for the impossible; they must know, even as they make the request, that they’re asking for something beyond anyone’s gift.
“This was why I found these words so moving—why I wished to embed their poignance at the heart of my novel. Because there are times when we human beings wish, from the depths of our souls, for something we know to be beyond anyone’s reach. I’ve come to realize that it’s on this territory—this no-man’s-land between what we desperately yearn for and what we know to be the limits of the possible—that I most like to work as a writer.”
Love this.