This week we reprinted William Donoghue’s “Killing McGinty Safely,” a short story about a hardened pedophile seeking to kill the man who has uncovered his secret. And of course, we asked Prof. Donoghue a couple questions about the piece.

What inspired this story?

The Boston clergy sex abuse scandal. We all know that the most respected and trusted individual can be leading a double life, in the basement or on the internet. I just wondered what it might sound like inside the head of someone like that. Sade was the first to discover the literary effect of juxtaposing rationality and bestiality, and that’s what I was after.

Looking at it five years later, is there anything you’d change?

Yes, I think I’d make it a bit clearer how McGinty has made the discovery on his computer that leads to his having to be killed. You don’t want to insult the reader’s intelligence by explaining too much, but in worrying about that, you can sometimes leave too much out. I think I’d spend a little more time on the computer angle, make it clear how both men visit the same child porn site and so on. The story horrified me to the point that I wanted it to be over as fast as possible.

How does this fit into your scholarly work?

As a student of the novel, I’m interested in color and tone more than story. I like the way Kawabata deals in silence, for example, or the way Beckett and Thomas Bernhard create inner voice landscapes. They’re not interested in plot. Plots are where you bury the dead.