The individual is a lie. Or, rather, a noble ideal. I don’t believe such a being exists, Enlightenment be damned. It’s a condition one can aspire to, but never actually attain. Like true democracy. Nobody is expressing themselves alone, they’re expressing — at best — a few thousand years of the cultures and peoples they’ve been exposed to as interpreted by one being. I’m sure it’s a kind of heresy to say this, especially as an American, but it’s preposterous to pretend that I don’t reveal my allegiances in everything I write. I’m aware of some allegiances and not even conscious of others but they’re all revealed on the page, for better and worse.