This week on The Book Show we discuss the role of writing in forming a national identity.
We go to Scotland, a country that has found itself at a cultural cross-roads recently with a referendum on membership of the UK in 2014 and now this year it will vote in another referendum on whether to remain in the EU or not.
Writers in Scotland have long been involved in political issues and we talk to Irvine Welsh, the author of Trainspotting, and to writer Alan Warner (Morven Caller, Their Lips Talk of Mischief). They take the long view back to discuss the writing of Hugh MacDiarmid and James Kelman both of whom exerted a great influence on 20th Century Scottish national identity. At the Scottish Storytelling Centre in Edinburgh, Donald Smith, the director there, argues that the complexities and confusions caused by these national debates are really a cause for celebration – they’re good for writers!
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Anakana Schofield’s second novel Martin John (And Other Stories) tells the difficult story of the title character. Martin John is a young man whose dark sexuality has made him a public nuisance. He has just left his home in the west of Ireland and is now living in London, supervised only by his mother from across the sea. The novel in spite of its complicated subject matter is a sympathetic portrait of a young man with a mental illness, told in an insightful and often humorous voice. Anakana talks to Sinéad about her novel and her mixed feelings for her main character, his motives, actions and remorse.
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JG Ballard’s 1975 novel, High Rise, has just been brought to the big screen. It’s director Ben Wheatley talks to Sinéad about the difficulties of filming such a book.
It tells the story of a high-rise apartment building in 70’s England – a social project dreamt up by architect Anthony Royal – played by Jeremy Irons in the film version. The cracks are beginning to appear, however, and small glitches like a broken lift soon escalate and the social order, carefully crafted by Royal, is threatened. It’s a tale of anarchy and class-warfare and Ben Wheatley is on hand to navigate us through it.
