Why me? Why? I’ve done you no harm.

If you follow this stuff, this’ll be an old canard by now, but Melville House has published a volume of interview with Roberto Bolaño called Roberto Bolaño: The Last Interview & Other Conversations (link) . The interviewer was Monica Maristain. The whole thing was translated by Sybil Perez. Here is an excerpt from it and below one question and one answer from that excerpt:

M.M.: Have you shed one tear about the widespread criticism you’ve drawn from your enemies?

R.B.: Lots and lots. Every time I read that someone has spoken badly of me I begin to cry, I drag myself across the floor, I scratch myself, I stop writing indefinitely, I lose my appetite, I smoke less, I engage in sport, I go for walks on the edge of the sea, which by the way is less than 30 meters from my house and I ask the seagulls, whose ancestors ate the fish who ate Ulysses: Why me? Why? I’ve done you no harm.