For me secondary school was a typical urban public high school - Cambridge High & Latin School, Cambridge, Massachussets. It was ethnically diverse (Cambridge has a large working class and Afro-American population) and boasted a student body of over 2,000. Although we were less than half a mile away from Harvard University and MIT was close by, neither college had any involvement with the school.

Cambridge High and Latin had a good academic track and a particularly good English department which was full of unmarried women with Irish surnames. I was taught by Higgins, O'Sullivans, Murphys, Conlons and Toomeys. But despite both this and the fact that Cambridge had a large Irish-American population and was in many ways a microcosm of Boston, at school we read no Irish literature.

We did, however, read the English classics with a vengeance. My mother, however, made up for the deficit. She had inherited the library of the South Bend (Indiana) Irish Women's Society when it closed, and so from quite a young age I was aware of Ireland's literary heritage.

I liked school and enjoyed the academic side, particularly English. Massachussets is a highly politicised state and this was reflected in the school where we enjoyed constant elections - for class officer, student councils and the like. My parents were devout Democrats and I grew up aware of the political process.

As a result I spent a lot of my time involved in elections. At that time I thought I would go in for politics as a career and I was politically active for a number of years.

After high school I went to Harvard where I studied English literature. I was blessed that I got to go to Harvard in the Sixties. It was the era of flower power, drugs and rock 'n roll and at the time Harvard on the East coast and Berkeley on the West were famous for their hot-bed campus activities.

Harvard was wonderfully diverse. People tend to think of it as stiff upper lip Ivy League, but it wasn't like that at all. The university had a large scholarship programme - I was one of the recipients - and I mixed with West Texas cowboys and lads from inner city Detroit as well as with other highly able students from all around the world.

During my time in Harvard I rose to the upper ranks of the student porter programme. As part of the financial aid I received I was given a part-time job on campus. That was how I got to clean the bathrooms of Vice-President Al Gore and actor Tommy Lee Jones! They were both a year behind me and at the time were just regular guys.

After college I joined the Peace Corps and spent some time in Central America before returning to my old school to teach. I came to Ireland in 1974 and it was then that I began to write. Eventually I went on to work full-time as an editor and writer.

Anthony Glavin is a Dublin-based editor and author whose novel Nighthawk Alley (New Island Books - £5.99) was published recently. He was in conversation with Yvonne Healy.