Authorship is exhibitionism, and readers a species of voyeur.

Guillemets frames the literary transaction as a charged exchange of exposure and looking. To write is to put private perceptions, desires, and vulnerabilities on display—an act akin to exhibitionism—while to read is to peer into another person’s interior life, like voyeurism. The line highlights the intimacy and asymmetry of authorship: the writer risks revelation (even when writing fiction), and the reader consumes that revelation at a safe distance. It also hints at the performative side of publishing—self-presentation, attention, and audience—while acknowledging that readers’ curiosity is part of what makes literature possible.