Way back in 1981, actor Robert Redford bought the movie rights to "The Love Hunter" by Minnesota novelist Jon Hassler. It's a powerful and dark story of a love triangle, with a main character who has multiple sclerosis. Redford was to play that part.

One day Hassler got a phone call from Redford's producer.

"Did you have any other disease in mind - a substitute for the MS?" the producer asked.

"No," Hassler said succinctly.

Well, the producer explained, Redford didn't want to look as sick and old as the character in the book.

"Too bad," said Hassler.

Partly aggravated and partly amused, Hassler did ask his literature class at St. John's University for ideas of an alternative disease. A student laughingly suggested herpes, probably also not a Redford-preferred affliction. For whatever reason, the film never was made. That's fine with Hassler, who protects the characters who have sprung - and crept - from his brain.

Now Hassler is 72 and ill with an incurable Parkinson's-like disease called Progressive Supranuclear Palsy (PSP). It's what killed actor Dudley Moore, but it's advancing slowly enough in Hassler that he can write almost every morning, from 7:30 to 10:30. He had two books published in 2004, another is due in December and he's busy with two more novels.

PSP claims most of its victims in six to 10 years. Hassler has had it for at least 11. It gives him no pain and despite the illness' name, he has no tremors. His mind is good. His vision and voice aren't. The muscles controlling eye movements are affected, and he sees double up-close. His gait is slow and wobbly. He falls often - 746 times in seven years. That's not a guess; he keeps track. Often he uses a cane or his new motorized wheelchair. He still rides a bicycle in Florida; for some reason, his balance is better on a bike than on foot.

Hassler admits to streaks of "Why me?" but says he's not depressed. "I've been spared that," he said, his words coming slowly but understandably. "My writing carries me through. I have something to get up for."

And someone. He and his third wife, Gretchen Kresl Hassler, have been married 11 years. His PSP was diagnosed just months after their wedding. A former special-education teacher in the Minneapolis public schools, she tenderly cares for him, reads aloud to him each evening and says she doesn't regret her caretaker role. "He never complains; he never gets crabby," she said. "He's still the same wonderful guy."

"It must be love," he said, grinning.

They have a townhouse in south Minneapolis and another in Florida for winters. Last month they sold their Florida place for one that's more handicapped-accessible. Several times a week, he falls at home and can't get up, and the Hasslers have figured out a way to restore him to verticality. It involves a nudge from her leg and strength from his arms.

Hassler also draws encouragement from his three children - Liz, who runs a bookstore in Brainerd, Minn.; David, who is a service technician for a company in Alexandria, Minn., that makes packaging machinery, and Michael, a Brainerd poet - and his two granddaughters. On his wife's side of the family are three more children and three more grandchildren.

Sometimes he wonders which disability he'd choose if he could switch. He can't come up with a substitute. Despite PSP, he can think critically, he can write, he could travel to Italy last year, he can enjoy life, he can pray. His fictional characters still speak to him, still surprise him with what they say and do. And happily, his wife said, "When we get out and people recognize him, I see a little extra gleam in his eyes."

Just like his favorite character, Agatha McGee, he keeps on plugging. "Life goes on" - that's their philosophy.

.

Better get started