I think any writer keeps going back to some basic theme. Sometimes it's autobiographical. I guess it usually is.

I think I would have been a writer, anyhow, in the sense of having written a story every now and then, or continued writing poetry. But it was the war experience and the two novels I wrote about Vietnam that really got me started as a professional writer.

I don't think I would have written a combat novel if I had just had peacetime military training. I think, in fact, I probably would have remained a poet and just written a short story every now and then.

You can drive yourself crazy looking for that common theme. I do think it's a process you go through, because the first part of solving a problem is identifying it. And if something shows up on a repetitive basis, you can address it head-on. But you look at our games, specifically last year, and each had its own set of circumstances.

But I think talent as a writer is hard-wired in, it's all there, at least the basic elements of it. You can't change it any more than you can choose whether to be right handed or left handed.

I think that sometimes in theater, I don't prepare much beyond going to the rehearsals.