Gwen: Yes. What are you going to write?
John: I want to try and write something for the ordinary sort of person, who’s just lost and discontented. There are some.
Gwen: Heaps and heaps.
John: That might be my job; it’s not much; when one talks of doing, what can one do, oneself, seems so inadequate. But it would have been a poor excuse before a tribunal: “I’m not going to join up.” “Why?” “I don’t see myself winning the war single-handed” ... plenty only stopped a bullet going into something else. I may only encourage somebody else to do something.
Gwen: You’re lucky having something you know you ought to do. I wish I had.
John: You have!
Gwen: What?
John: There’s one way all our lot can help: it’s probably the best way, too.
Gwen: What is it?
John: To live by what you believe, which is difficult ... and not by what you don’t believe, which is easy.