This is a fascinating piece. What sparked you to write it now, 20 years after the event?

I’ve always wanted to write the story because it was such a weird thing to be doing when I was 17, and it kind of impressed me when I looked back on it, that I had so much gall.

Inevitably, readers will come to it in the context of the wider conversation about male privilege and predatory behaviour. How do you feel about that?

I hope that it maybe shakes people out of the black-and-white thinking about it… I’m not trying to undermine an actual victim’s experience, and I don’t know a single woman who hasn’t felt victimised by misogyny or sexual aggression, and I’m not trying to undermine any of that. But I do think we get to tell the stories that we want. And I wanted to tell a story in which I wasn’t a victim, I was an active, empowered participant, trying to get something. This is not my sob story; it is rather an example of how sex and power dynamics don’t always lead to a victim experience. Women are powerful too; actually, we have a lot of power.

In fact, “Rupert” ends up pretty pissed off…

I knew that what was I asking for was building an expectation for payback in some way. And then I just said, no. Sorry. I’ve used you. But I’m sure it was the right thing for both of us. I don’t really think he would have felt any better about himself had I slept with him. That would probably have been terrible for him. Especially now, because then I would have the story that, yes, and then that happened. Then that’s a totally different story. That’s a disgusting story.

To what extent was the relationship you formed with him part of the learning process?

I think it was part of the writing lesson insofar as all intense engagement informs your sense of self and, as a writer, your sense of self is extremely important. I was not completely naive, but I also didn’t know how I was going to behave. Like, how much could I handle? And I saw that I could handle a lot. It gave me some insight into my own strengths and, like, arrogance, which has been an asset. My arrogance as a writer has been really important [laughs].

It’s a generalisation, but can you be a writer without at least some arrogance? Is humility a drawback?

I’m sure for some people [humility] could be the ticket in, the key in to the world of imagination and creativity. But for me it seems – not to bring it into the social-political conversation too much – that women don’t really need to be taught to humble themselves. Because at least in my generation we were born into a place where we were already lower, and I think arrogance might just be the thing to level the playing field a little bit.

Your confidence and determination to succeed as a writer is key to this account. Where did that come from?

Just a certainty that I loved what I was doing and that there was nothing I wanted to do more. So I pushed forward without question. I wanted to learn everything I could.

Do you feel like the same person two decades later?

Yes, I do. But I think I have a different process for learning – I’m less interested in what other people say, more interested in what I can find out from the world outside of the literary world.

What caused that to change?

I spent enough time in those circles and also in institutions, and my writing got much better when I left, it got much more exciting for me personally, and I think better because I had the wisdom of perspective and objectivity about the elitist cultures in the New York literary scene.

I very quickly realised that the authorities that people look up to in culture really don’t necessarily reflect what is most valuable about human nature or about art. It was good to know that this is the way that industry works but I’m not really interested in being part of an industry.

We never quite know what advice the legendary writer gives you. Why?

I didn’t want to reveal anything about him, more than I had already. And also there’s something sort of sacred about learning an art lesson. You don’t want to just summarise it and put it in an article. That would have been tacky.

In your new novel, My Year of Rest and Relaxation, you describe a young woman’s desire to put herself to sleep for a year, and emerge reborn. Where did that idea come from?

It was fun, but it was also really sad. I wrote it in a very sad and unsure couple of years in my life. I was moving around, and didn’t really have a home, and the book kind of became my home, a place where I belonged. I think maybe because I was moving around so much and abandoning lives, I started to feel similar to my character in some ways, asking myself the question of whether nostalgia and attachment are actually good for me, or is it better to be detached and depend on your most essential characteristics as a person.