Happy birthday …

… Edna O’Brien on turning 90: ‘I can’t pretend that I haven’t made mistakes.’ (Hat tip, Dave Lull.)

Where many writers retreat into themselves as they age, O’Brien has instead embraced risk, something she attributes to her short-story writing, in particular a story about an Irish workman, which saw her conduct interviews across north London pubs. “It changed the way I wrote – everything I’ve written since then I’ve researched intensely,” she says. “I would hope that the pulse of my writing is about feeling, about going inside it and bringing it back out. The authors I love [who include everyone from Russian master Anton Chekhov to experimental Scottish writer David Keenan], they do it too. I do think one has to keep learning and it does get harder because you are harder on yourself. You don’t want to repeat yourself – it has to be fresh.”

Edna O'Brien turns 90 tomorrow.