STOLEN FRAGMENTS: EPISODES FROM SIX LIVES

Over the years I have tried my hand at researching and writing on a variety of subjects, e.g. Wikipedia, Captain Cook, Tudor history. The trouble is I never seem able to stick with any one subject for very long – the boredom factor always enters the equation. Otherwise, no doubt by now I might have become a real expert on something! My latest project, however, took plenty of researching but no writing at all. It involves constructing literary collages, or ‘assemblages’. My definition of an assemblage is a collection of bits and pieces taken from other peoples’ books and articles, and put together without commentary in an (I hope) logical way, so as to form a discourse, perhaps even a narrative, on a particular topic. The idea is to make the extracts fairly short, and avoid using any particular source too heavily. (…)

Dan O’Sullivan was born in India in 1936 but has lived most of his life in the UK. He has degrees from Cambridge and the University of East Anglia. He is a retired history teacher and lecturer who has published books on a range of topics, including most recently Wikipedia. He is married, with four grown-up children and two grandsons, and lives in a village on the edge of the North York Moors.