Mike Craig answers 13 questions in a Booker's Dozen.
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TPQ: What are you currently reading?
MC: We'll Take A Cup Of Kindness Yet, John Throne.
TPQ: Best book you have ever read?
MC: Germinal; Emile Zola.
TPQ: First book to really own you?
MC: The Condition Of The Working Class In England; Friedrich Engels.
TPQ: A must read before you die?
MC: The Day We Won The Class War; It hasn't been written yet.
TPQ: A preference for fact or fiction?
MC: Fact, Being dyslexic, I find reading to be hard work, so reality first.
TPQ: Favourite male and female author?
MC: Orwell and Mary Kenny.
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| A Berlin Book Tower in memory of the Nazi book burning. |
TPQ: Book most cherished as a child?
MC: Pinocchio.
TPQ: Favourite childhood author?
MC: Carlo Collodi.
TPQ: Any book you point blank refuse to read?
MC: Harry Potter.
TPQ: Any author you point blank refuse to read?
MC: David Starkey.
TPQ: Pick a book to give to somebody so that they would more fully understand you.
MC: I'm not sure that there is one. Das Capital perhaps.
TPQ: Last book you gave as a present?
MC: The Donegal Woman; John Throne.
TPQ: Book you would most like to see turned into a movie?
MC: Germany Calling; Mary Kenny.
⏩Mike Craig was born in Belfast to atheist parents in the 1950s. Now living near Moneymore, Co. Derry, he is a member of Left Horizons, the UK Labour Party, and Unite The Union, and is an advocate of Universal Basic Income. He is a retired electronics technician, has 11 Grandchildren and 4 Great Grandchildren.
Pinocchio can be scary as a kid. A bit like The Cat in the Hat.
ReplyDeleteI feel Orwell gets treated unfairly, particularly in reference to his blacklist which I believe he wrote under pressure when he was seriously ill. His anti-Irish comments appear to be true but reported out of proportion and often through hearsay. I like his books and am prepared to give him the benefit of the doubt. Divorcing the art from the artist is vital in certain cases more than others. You can enjoy Alice in Wonderland but not like the author for example.
ReplyDeleteSimon
Scary but exciting, and with a few life lessons too.
Orwell was on the right side of things for most of his life, and for me that's what counts. The style of his writing was just right for the dyslexic reader because he didn't waste words. He didn't write just to show off his command of the use of language and even wrote a short book on this subject 'Why I Write'.
At the opposite end of the scale -of writing for its own sake, there's Anthony Burgess. His work defies the maxim 'if it's popular it can't be good', His work was brilliant but much of it I found unreadable. I had two attempts at Earthly Powers, before I gave up, and it almost put me off reading novels for good.
Mike, your point on Orwell reminds me of how I found Dan Brown's (of Da Vinci Code fame) writings as if he was saying "look how clever I am" whereas someone like Stephen Fry carries that message over without labouring the point.
DeleteOf Burgess, I have only read A Clockwork Orange and it was a little unwieldy although as you say excellent.
It must be difficult reading made up words if dyslexic and A Clockwork Orange has a plethora of them. I am only guessing as I don't know how it works.
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell has two made up languages for a major part of the book. Strange but readable.
Mike - thanks for doing this for us.
ReplyDeleteI read a lot of Orwell and still find him one of the more insightful mind who could make simple what others tried to make complex. His unremitting opposition to totalitarian systems was unshakeable and I very much think it guided his blacklist. I think Fred Mazelis was admirably fair to Orwell in his observation:
On one level, Orwell’s action in turning over these comments was not the same as those of the political cowards who sought to save their careers during the McCarthyite witch-hunt by ‘naming names’ of prominent figures who had been in or around the Communist Party years earlier. In Orwell’s case, there was no cowardice or personal opportunism involved. He was never a man to curry favor with the establishment, and the political characterizations on his list were by and large similar to sentiments he had expressed publicly.
At the same time, Orwell’s action was a political statement. The author of Homage to Catalonia had become so embittered by Stalinist betrayals that he was prepared to make common political cause with British imperialism. He considered bourgeois democracy the ‘lesser evil’ in relation to Stalinism. This was a political judgment which testified to his rejection of Marxism and of a genuinely revolutionary perspective.
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