A departure for us, seeing a writer on stage, reading from one of his essays and in conversation with his editor.
Not that his writings are that foreign to me: I've read Fever Pitch, High Fidelity, A Long Way Down, and The Polysyllabic Spree; just bought his latest book Funny Girl, and at least seen a few of his books that were turned into films: Fever Pitch - both the UK original starring Colin Firth, and the inferior US version starring Jimmy Fallon; About a Boy, An Education, and Wild (for which he wrote the screenplay).
He turns out to be a well-educated and intelligent man, albeit with few of the snooty trimmings that often go with those characteristics. He's surprisingly humble, down-to-earth, and unsurprisingly very funny.
The essay he read from was one of his earliest submissions to The Believer magazine, described his early work as a "Can't do" teacher and odd-but-sometimes-difficult-jobber at a Korean trading company in London.
The only negative I could spot is his love of Arsenal Football Club. Still, you can't have everything.
No comments:
Post a Comment