Simon Winchester still remembers the phone number that ultimately led to his success. He had written twelve books, and was well into planning on his thirteenth (having already bought a tramp steamer with his publishers’ money to staff for a book on trade routes around the world) when by chance, he saw a book called Chasing the Sun, by Jonathon Green – about dictionaries. In it, while relaxing in the bath, he read about Dr W.C. Minor, who was a major contributor to the Oxford Dictionary, and was fascinated by this murderous lunatic. He called a lexicographer friend – she of the number – and what she told him led him to write what was titled The Surgeon of Crowthorne in the UK, and The Madman and the Professor in the USA.
Greg O’Brien chaired this event, and his questions were perfectly pitched between levity and a clear admiration for what Winchester has achieved. Winchester was told by a Korean fortune teller that he would write 38 books exactly: so far, he is at 30, so eight more to come then. He is a non-conformist scholar, and the most general you can get when speaking of his books is that he studies the human record of things, though his degree was in geology.
One of the great things about Winchester’s books, says O’Brien, is that he has stood in the places he is speaking about – he doesn’t just read it, he lives it. Asked whether he serves Literature or Journalism as a master, Winchester said, “To write something in 12,000 words is easy; to write something in 100,000 words is easy, it just takes longer. But once you pare it down, it becomes more difficult.” He hasn’t done journalism, except long-form journalism, for some time now; his books are not what he would call journalism.
He started his life as a geologist until he read a book by James Morris, and wondered if perhaps he could write books instead. At Morris’ suggestion, he dropped geology and became a journalist, ultimately becoming a war correspondent. His first book was about Northern Island, where he had been stationed during the uprisings. His second, American Heartbeat, has still only sold 13 copies. I couldn’t help thinking then that if he had been publishing in today’s environment, that would have been his final opportunity! As it was, he got to 12 books before The Surgeon of Crowthorne, which he wrote in his early 50’s, just as he was worried he was being ‘put out to grass’ as a war correspondent.
His US publisher didn’t like the idea of this new book (as opposed to that of the ‘tramp steamer’ above) so they cancelled his contract, as books about a single person at that time were just not as popular in the trade. Ultimately, once the book was published, his agent found a USA publisher for it, and the rest was history. At the time it exploded, he was researching another book in Canada, tramping across the icy wastelands of the north when he received a radio transmission to make it to the nearest phone. This phone call ended in his being flown out of Canada, to New York, then back again to rejoin his expedition, for an interview with Mel Gusso, which ended (three months later) in a 4,000-word feature about Winchester and The Professor and the Madman in the Arts pages of the New York Times.
While the success of The Surgeon of Crowthorne gave him security as an author, Winchester thought that now his publishers had decided he can only write sure-fire bestsellers. This is a feeling echoed by Cornelia Funke in The Kids are All Right – there is a level of obscurity that can be helpful to creative freedom, it seems!
Winchester always writes on big topics, says O’Brien, often beginning with one person but ultimately enclosing a much broader topic. More recently, of course, he has begun writing books about oceans. “I had written a previous book about the Pacific,” said Winchester, “But it was bad. I wanted to right the wrongs.”
As Winchester works across so many topics and writes in such broad strokes, O’Brien asked him whether he gets in trouble with scholars when he publishes his books. While it doesn’t often happen, said Winchester, when he wrote The Map that Changed the World, he did get in trouble with a biographer of William Smith who had given him help with his research while he was writing the book. The expert’s book deal was cancelled thanks to Winchester’s book, so he accused Winchester publicly of plagiarism – luckily, this accusation never saw the light of day as it didn’t check out.
This was a fascinating session, which took in many dog-legs, including a long story about a well-known surveyor who successfully led a double life, simultaneously as a white man and a black man. This only became known upon his deathbed.
Simon Winchester is now working on a book about precision, and how it took over the world. This book will be a homage to his father, who was a precision engineer.
If you weren’t in the 700-odd-strong audience at The Embassy on Thursday, I suggest your have a listen to the Radio NZ recording of this session here. In the meantime, check some of Winchester’s books out – I certainly intend to.
Attended and reviewed by Sarah Forster
Simon Winchester: Pacific Future
4.30pm, Thursday 10 March, Embassy Theatre
NZ Festival Writer’s Week
NB: This was actually the first event I attended at the Writer’s Festival, but the notes were trapped on my work computer until today. Apologies for the delay in reportage!
Muriel Barbery also writes beyond my level of comprehension, but at least she’s frequently translated. Her novel The Elegance of the Hedgehog has been translated into many languages, it’s a New York Times best seller and it’s absolutely gorgeous. Her latest novel, The Life of Elves has also been translated and just as Hedgehog made a delightful film, I believe Elves will, too.
Muriel Barbery also spoke of France in terms of its abundance of assets. “We have everything we need but we still want more. We are spoiled. We are like spoiled children. The rest of the world knows this more than we do I think.”
Again Fargues took a more direct approach.”I love my country but I don’t want to live there anymore. It’s like loving a member of your family who isn’t taking care of themselves anymore. It’s too hard. You are better to love them from afar.
When it comes to change, we all know that the polished creatures we meet at Writers Festivals didn’t start out that way. Not all, but most, had other professions when they began their writing careers.
Godfery, who works a lot with trade unions, spoke about the demand he sees within Aotearoa to radically reshape politics. We have two options: disruption or resignation. He says that young people are increasingly choosing the former, although he acknowledges that this is reflected neither in political polls nor in voter turnout. He spoke about the attack on traditional institutions of dissent (eg media, unions).
Meredith works at MIT in Otara. “So many young people are degree pioneers in their family, and they’re paying for an education we can’t even confirm will happen. Critical thinking won’t feed anyone.” She pointed out that debates about home ownership ignore the fact that different cultures have different concepts of ownership. Families living in communities where they have social housing can also feel that they own their homes, even if their names aren’t on the title deeds. “People stay within their communities just to survive”, where they are part of a group to which they add value just by being alive.
Heath’s chairing style was unobtrusive, which is generally welcome. Unfortunately, in this instance, I think Bartlett in particular could have done with quite a lot of reining in. Invited to give a quick introduction to Loomio, Bartlett spent some time talking in detail about his feelings about Occupy Wellington and how his experiences there contributed to his spiritual development. “It was a totally singular experience in my life … it’s hard to describe what it’s like to be part of a global superhuman collective intelligence, but it was pretty sweet.”
Dalton was a much better panel member: articulate, comparatively concise, and entertaining (his opening line was “my name is Nigel Dalton and I work for Rupert Murdoch: I’ll see myself out”). He summarised Bartlett’s point about the dissonance between collective decision-making and inclusiveness – “the problem is you have to include the assholes” – before saying that, in his experience, “a magical thing happens when engineers turn 34” in that they tend to get over themselves a bit and learn to work well with others. (Bartlett is an engineer and looks to be around that age. Dalton is, at a guess, in his 60s.)
The stories began with one from Mariko Tamaki (right), a Canadian cartoonist who spoke about linguistics and the use of speech to refer to gender. Etger Keret, an Israeli short story writer, was up next, telling us a story about a terrifying taxi ride. Essayist Robert Dessaix had us just short of rolling in the aisles with his talk about how babies were made (and how gossip ruins family reputations). Children’s novelist Sally Gardner’s lexical ability had us all agape in awe, and Courtney Sina Meredith told a powerful story about race and identity to round it off.
Etgar Keret’s son asked him to Google something one night recently. “What is that son?” “I want you to Google a place that nobody kills each other.” “I’m not going to do that son, because it doesn’t exist.” “But grandma says it might be New Zealand.” He is concerned about fighting, as living in Israel, his son will be conscripted to the Israeli Army when he reaches his 18th Birthday. Keret read a piece out about a taxi ride, where the driver was erratic and angry, and yelled at Keret’s then 3-year-old son for “breaking” the taxi. The driver had been spoiling for a fight, but it took the wisdom of a 3-year-old to help ease tensions.
Robert Dessaix (right) was hilarious, telling a story about how as a 5-year-old, he told his 6-year-old female neighbour where children came from. She pressed him on it, saying it was ‘disgusting’, then asking him where all other living things came from, until she got to Jesus. Dessaix said, “He came from an egg; an Easter Egg, everyone knows that.” As news tends to do in small neighbourhoods, his neighbour told her friend, who told hers, who told her piano teacher, who happened to be a nun. The Dessaix family were ostracised for weeks, until the aunty of his neighbour brought them a pop-up toaster in apology.
Sally Gardner (left) is dyslexic, and is a spokesperson for dyslexia in the UK. She told us about her trip around the South Island prior to coming to the festival, which led into a wonderful talk about the failure of the education system, particularly in the UK. She said, “The Educational system seems to want rows of conifer trees – when the world needs these different thinkers. There is no nation without imagination – many of our modern geniuses – Bill Gates, Steve Jobs – were dyslexic. The time has come to celebrate the diversity of our children. It doesn’t matter how we spell words, it matters what we say.”
This was one of those events that I picked at random, on the grounds that Etgar Keret sounded like an interesting name, and I don’t know many Israeli people and would like to hear from one. I’m so glad I did.
Tina Makereti introduced Nnedi Okorafor beautifully, as somebody who brings “a kete overflowing with stories.” Nnedi has written works for adults, youth and children – a tweeter reviewed her work as “like swallowing the sun.”
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