Explore "Inside John Barth" by William W. Stuart on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
I wasn't as bad off as old Faust and his deal with the devil. My soul was still my own. But my body was community property -- and I couldn't, by God, so much as bite my own tongue without feeling like a bloody murderer -- and being made to suffer for it, too.
Perhaps you don't think biting your tongue is any great privilege to have to give up. Maybe not. But, no matter how you figure, you've got to admit the situation was -- well -- confining.