Martin Booth (1944–2004) was an English novelist and screenwriter, shortlisted for the Booker Prize, and the author of thirteen novels, translated into many languages. Based on the novel “A Very Private Gentleman,” the feature film “The American,” starring George Clooney, was made in 2010. “I am Signor Farfalla. Mister Moth. Here they think that this is how I make a living - by drawing butterflies and moths. This is a very convenient cover. Accurately portraying one of these creatures is no easy task and requires attention to detail. It is only because of my tireless passion for detail that I am still alive today. My job is to create gift wrapping for death. I am a merchant of death, I am a judge who can bring death into existence with the same ease with which a circus magician takes a dove out of a scarf. I am not the creator of death. I am only the organizer of its delivery. I am the porter of death, its bellhop. I am a guide on the path into darkness. A man with his hand on a switch. This is why I am a proponent of premeditated murder. There is no better death. Death must be noble, neat, unconditional, precise, unique. Its beauty is in its completeness. This is the last brush stroke on the canvas of life, the last spot of color that completes the picture, giving it perfection. Death should be neat, precise, like a surgical incision. Life is a blunt instrument. Death is a scalpel, sharp as a flash.”