Look and Listen

Biography

I wrote my novel CENTRUM when I was a student back in the 1950's. I was studying medicine in Switzerland and Belgium after having received my BSc from a Canadian university. I soon found myself more engrossed in the labs of Europe's streets, cafés and salons than in the science labs of the universities. My inspiration for writing this particular novel came from knowing the characters I write about: their social/political influences and reactions. It was reconstruction time after World War II and the beginning of the very hot Cold War.

Inspiration

I found that I was doing character sketches -- some in depth as essays, some as actual pencil/charcoal sketches. These were, at first, nothing else but mnemonic 'reminders' --- not meant to be incorporated into a book. But soon I found my characters begin to relate. It's an author's cliché, but I had to just sit back and record 'how' they related to each other --- all within the historical context of their time. The novel took 3 years of research; 1 year of intensive writing. It incorporates my experiences (through my characters) in Belgium, France, Switzerland, North Africa and America. Then it remained in my basement in Canada for 50 years --- untouched. In the meantime I became owner of a Film Distribution Company (oh - before that I drove truck); I have always been an active Chess player and this led to me organizing the World Chess Festival 1988 in my home town (Tal, Karpov, Kasparov, Seirawan -- all the world's top players). With the advent of Computers my eclectic life took a new turn. I am owner/president of Training and Consultation Services. I have only recently semi-retired from being an IT solution provider for some major corporations. Back to my basement. The ghosts of all those characters I loved so dearly were beckoning, especially because of present day political upheavals. Terms such as 'insurgency', 'jihad', 'counter revolution', 'reprisal', 'divided loyalties', etc. that are prevalent in today's news were terms I dealt with in CENTRUM 50 years ago. I felt it was worth-the-while for readers to understand the present from the perspective of the world from 1944 to 1958. And so I've spent this past year slashing much of the youthful indulgences from the initial draft (but admittedly kept them in a file). What I had typed on an old Olivetti had to be transcribed to my PC.