I remember at the age of eight or nine becoming aware of myself as a child inordinately given to fantasy. At the time I felt this to be a form of self-indulgence, and felt guilty about it; my feelings of guiltiness were fortified by the very puritan culture in which I lived, as well as by disapproving comments from people who knew me well, my uncles in particular (but not my mother). I compared myself with other children of my age, contrasting the ease with which they handled the real world with my own ineptitude. Nonetheless, I never thought of giving up my fantasy life and attaching myself to the real. Rather, I accepted fantasising as a kind of affliction that had been visited on me at birth, a congenital disease that I was doomed to carry.

I am glad, looking back, that I had the good sense not to cure myself of my disease.

J. M. Coetzee, The Good Story: Exchanges on Truth, Fiction and Psychotherapy (2015)