Many writers have shared their thoughts with the public:

"There is something delicious about writing the first words of a story. You never quite know where they'll take you." - Beatrix Potter

"The role of a writer is not to say what we all can say, but what we are unable to say." - Anaïs Nin

"Sharing your writing, being enlarged by others' writing, is what makes you feel famous." - Gretchen Bernabei

"Writing is not an amusing occupation. It is a combination of ditch-digging, mountain-climbing, treadmill and childbirth." - Edna Ferber

"Either write something worth reading or do something worth writing." - Ben Franklin

"One must be drenched in words, literally soaked in them, to have the right ones to form themselves into the proper pattern at the right moment." - Hart Crane

"There are three rules for writing. Unfortunately, no one can agree what they are." - W. Somerset Maugham

The Baker

The baker fought the soft, warm dough, slashing with his biggest bread knife, lunging and kicking. The dough healed with a slow ooze and continued to advance. Sourdough loaves formed boots around his feet, dragging him down into a lake of pomegranate molasses.

Margot woke with his screams. She shook him gently, careful to avoid his flailing hands and feet. Once, she’d woken him in the middle of a brioche attack and he’d punched her in the face.

“Wake up, you’re having another nightmare,” she said, feeling his pyjamas damp with sweat.

The baker’s electric blue eyes snapped open.

“Dough assault,” he whispered. “I can’t take it anymore.”

“It can’t kill you, it’s just bread,” said Margot. “Ben, look at me, it’s just bread.”

She was wrong, it wasn’t just bread anymore. Ben didn’t know if bread could ever be 'just bread' again. Many moons ago, when baking was fun, his crusty rolls sold out in minutes. His soft white loaves were a picnic staple with locals. The shop was in the main street, painted red, adorned with a sign reading Ben’s Bakery.

Each morning he’d rise at two-thirty and walk through the sleeping streets to his shop. Ovens warmed the yeasty air and bread rose and cooked and crusted golden brown and all was well with the world.

Then came Margot. She swanned into the bakery one weekend. Margot was from Food Avenue, the new cooking show, looking for the next big thing, or any sized thing really, it didn’t have to be big, as long as it hadn’t been done too many times before. Almost every food known to man and some that Margot wished had stayed unknown had been diced, pureed, head-to-tailed, roasted, deconstructed, crockembouched and pannacotted to death. Underwater chefs prepared tantalising seafood in a kitchen constructed in the Agean Sea and pavements had been found in Kuwait which were not only hot enough to fry eggs, but to create a four course meal. Executives at Food Avenue worried that there was nothing left to prepare, cook, taste, drizzle, or eat.

Margot, however, was young and positive. A friend had given her a tip-off about a baker who might be suitable for a show, so here she was, in the town that time forgot, walking into ye olde, quaint bread shoppe.

“Can I help you?” asked Ben.

Margot squealed with delight. Ben had baker and television written all over his rosy cheeks. She admired his sparkling blue eyes and lovely, long dark eyelashes, so black you’d expect to see soot on his cheeks from the fallout. She decided she must have Ben and his buns at any price.

Margot reminded Ben of an enthusiastic, trimmed, well-washed string bean. He agreed to be filmed on her brand-spanking new, phone-sized, multi-function electronic device. The machine was so advanced that it had refused to be named by the company which created it and wished to be known as |||. Margot and ||| thought Ben to be perfect on camera, and ||| knew everything. Margot’s producer agreed that Ben was the goods. Margot offered him pots of money.

Season One of Ben’s Bakery was a joyful, simple bakefest. The television crew squeezed themselves into Ben’s shop to film. Viewers learned to make poppy seed baguettes, plaited loaves, custard tarts, cheesy scrolls, apple strudel and jam tarts.

Margot became Ben’s girlfriend.

For Season Two, a larger replica of Ben’s Bakery was built in a television studio, in the city. Ben moved to a fashionable apartment nearby. As an in-demand celebrity, he made cross-promotional appearances on other shows, including being a judge on So You Think You Can Simultaneously Cook, Dance, Model, Survive, Renovate and Sing? There he met a tap-dancing French chef with astonishing knife skills. Antoine could literally cut the air with a knife and fold it into a mousse. The baker and the chef became friends. One night, after filming, Antoine invited Ben to The Silver Oven at midnight.

“I’ve heard chefs whispering about The Silver Oven,” said Ben, “but I thought it was an urban myth.”

“It is very real,” said Antoine, juggling macarons, “and tonight your eyes will be opened so wide zat your brain may try to escape sru them.”

The baker followed the French chef through a series of dark lanes. Antoine ignored the queue and presented himself to the doorman.

“Poulet a la Provencale,” he whispered to the doorman, who ushered them into a corridor.

“Ze password changes daily and is texted to ze chosen few,” explained Antoine.

Ben stayed near the door listening to the hopeful public trying to get into The Silver Oven. Without a password, they had to rely on food knowledge.

The next person in the queue couldn’t give the doorman the correct proportion of flour to butter needed for baychamel sauce. She was sent to the back of the queue, grumbling that she’d been studying dry marinades all bloody week and it was just typical that she got a sauce question tonight.

The corridor opened into a cavernous, completely round space. Half-naked kitchenhands suspended in cages chopped vegetables which rained down on foodlovers. Trapeze artists swung down from the roof offering trays of hors d’oeuvres. Knights wearing grain-mail jousted with baguette swords. Chefs cooked at eighteen fully equipped kitchenettes in front of state-of-the-art ovens which curved into the walls.

“Anysing goes here,” said Antoine, “Cook your dreams, Ben. Ingredients are in ze pantry.”

“I make bread, and tarts,” said Ben, “I don’t really do fancy, but this place is amazing. I might just watch.”

“You probably won’t just watch,” Antoine said, “when you’ve seen ze pantry.”

Ben spent an hour in the pantry discovering flour the likes of which he’d never heard. Blends of Aztec-derived ancient grain flour flirted with lupin and sweet potato triple-milled. Coconut and flaxseed blends jostled Justin Bieber-inspired mixes. When Ben emerged with bunches of flours in his basket, Antoine had already chosen a kitchenette and was tap dancing on the sink.

Ben claimed an unoccupied kitchenette and began creating, thinking outside the bread box. The salivating crowd in front of Ben’s oven parted for Antoine, who brought Ben a bowl of pomegranate molasses. Ben made crusty niblets with the molasses, adding Aztec flour, dry wild yeast, shattered Peruvian sugar, Celtic sea salt and tepid Himalayan mountain dew collected at dawn. The resulting tasty treats were distributed by models wearing fairy wings riding white horses, otherwise known as angels on horseback. The crowd bayed for more.

Ben left The Silver Oven at sunrise, and only then because the cleaners came in and told him to leave.

Each night when The Silver Oven opened at midnight, he returned. Having proved his worth, he was now a daily recipient of the password. Margot was worried about Ben. Not only did he bake all night, he filmed Season Three of Ben’s Bakery during the day, and hardly slept.

There were tired red lines running through the whites of his eyes, but he was as excited as a toddler with a can of Red Bull. Season Three showed off the amazing breads Ben had tried, improved and perfected at The Silver Oven. Margot worried at the complexity of his offerings, way beyond the price range and skill set of most home cooks, but the show’s ratings continued to rise. As Ben’s first and most respected taster, she gradually became less string bean and more pear-shaped.

One night, Ben spoke to Margot in a low, respectful whisper of The Ultimate Loaf. He was so close, he said, he could taste it. Ben combined flours using a method considered illegal in thirty-six countries. He grew yeast in his apartment, tending to it daily, continually on the lookout for spies and yeast thieves. The apartment smelled like a brewery.

Margot suggested that he see a doctor about his paranoia, unrealistic expectations, nightmares and more and more frequent fits of anger.

Ben turned his fury toward his product. He overproved dough, burned it and mocked it with excessive amounts of salt. He held bowls of activated yeast next to flour but didn’t let them play. He tied his knot rolls so tightly that they choked, pumped his pumpernickel full of nickel and watched it explode when baked.

The crowd at The Silver Oven complained to management when Ben hurled burnt niblets at their heads. A kitchenhand was half-baked into a coconut and pineapple twist. Ben was banned for life from The Silver Oven. Season Four of Ben’s Bakery was cancelled when he insisted that the stoneground flour provided must contain pebbles.

Margot left Ben for a mild-mannered accountant who couldn’t cook.

No-one saw Ben for months. Antoine forced his way into Ben’s apartment through rancid dough and carpets sticky with yeast. Ben had taken to his bed, rising only to flay himself with strips of Turkish Bread. There was no light left in his eyes.

“It’s my fault,” said Antoine, “it was too much too soon. Ze Silver Oven was no place for you, I see zat now. I should have known, I’ve seen Fish Chefs srow zemselves into the ocean and Pastry Chefs fondant zemselves into psychiatric hospitals. Ben, I am your friend. I’m here to help.”

Antoine scraped dough from the walls, shampooed the carpet and took away the Turkish Bread. He didn’t allow Ben to bake for three months. The baker was encouraged to grill, boil and fricassee instead. Antoine pulled Ben’s hands away when he attempted to knead a chicken. He carried the baker inside when Ben took a nude flour bath in the garden.

After three months of progress, Antoine gave Ben a small cob loaf to look after. Ben drowned it in a bucket. Two months later, he was given another. This one he wrapped in a teatowel and crooned gently to it, he had finally got his groove back. Ben returned to his old house, his old town and his olde quaint bread shoppe. His customers told him how much he’d been missed. When he put a Bacon-and-Garlic Infused Ciabatta with Rosemary Chips in the window, they turned away from the fancy intruder. Ben threw it in the bin after two days and baked the bread his customers wanted. Made with white flour, golden brown on the outside, fluffy on the inside, with no extra flavourings competing with the fresh bread taste.

His customers were happy, they snapped up the loaves made with the same recipe that Ben had used in the past, the staple of Ben’s Bakery. There was none better. They considered it to be The Ultimate Loaf. It was perfect for picnics and jam sandwiches and if you think about it, that’s all bread needs to be.