THC: Based on what realization?

JE: That I wanted to have a life. That I wanted to have a life. That I wanted to lead a decent life, a noncriminal life. That I didn't want to destroy myself, that I wanted to be a productive member of society.

THC: For me at least, there has always been an element of romance in a lifestyle like that, which is not mainstream, which is anti-establishment-

JE: I wanted to join the establishment.I wanted to write books. I wanted to meet women. Iwanted ultimately to get married. I wantedultimately to get married. I wanted to earn money.I am not a member of the counter culture, I neverhave been. I'm impatient with it. I don't likerock and roll. It's institutionalizedrebelliousness to me. I wanted to live square,live right and live right and live productively.And it was only when I decided to put down thedrugs, stupid adventuring and everything else thatI was able to sit down and write books.

THC: What would you say to that portion of yourreaders who might embrace you as a champion ofprecisely that lifestyle just because some of yourcharacters are so flagrantly so.

JE: I'm a Republican.

THC: [shifting uncomfortably]

JE: That's what I would tell them.

THC: Is there any part of you that lives out afantasy through your seedier and more criminalcharacters like Danny Getchell?

JE: Crime to me, dark social history, ebb andflow of dark events, the near psychopathic,semi-psychopathic, the leg-breakers of history area voice for me to express my moral concernsbecause these are men who paid morally for theirdark deeds. I am first and last and always amoralist. They are the means for me to recreatehistory to my own specifications, but I am notthem.There is a definite distinction betweenmost writers and their work. Because the work is,in the end, as it is in my case, a work ofimagination, with the exception of thenon-fiction.

THC: What do you perceive is the persona thatthe popular press has made you out to be?

JE: A wild man. I have a wild imagination. Iknow how to perform in front of a crowd. That'sfive percent of it. Specifically, when I go on abook tour, I feel like an animal that's beenuncaged.

THC: Are you slightly psychopathic?

JE: No. I am contemplative. I'm hardworking.I'm meticulous, I'm diligent, I have a veryfinely-attuned conscience