![]() ![]() So the book became a journey back from mental disorder and suicide (Stuart is dead by the time Masters has finished taking his advice) into sanity and childhood – in search of causes. At a stroke, he had understood what was naturally good in Masters's writing – its co-operative sympathy – but recognised that it needed reorganising around a different design. The few British publishers who still care about editing could take notes from Stuart. What murdered the boy I was? See? Write it backwards." Masters takes the advice and provides, at once, an inciting incident to establish the nature of the relationship and an alluring narrative construction. "Do it the other way round," he suggests. Not wishing to offend Masters further, Stuart comes up with a brilliantly simple editorial intervention. ![]() Masters's homeless street raconteur, Stuart Shorter, tells his biographer that the first draft of the book is "bollocks boring". ![]() T he moment that made a success of Alexander Masters's first book, Stuart: A Life Backwards, is described in its opening pages. ![]()
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