:00:15. > :00:19.I am in north London, home for many years for the South African
:00:19. > :00:25.novelist, Justin Cartwright. All his novels dwell on the middle
:00:25. > :00:30.class family dealing with betrayal, decepion and modern life. Justin
:00:30. > :00:33.Cartwright has enjoyed enormous success. Yet he is not as well-
:00:33. > :00:37.known as that success might suggest. His latest novel, Other People's
:00:37. > :00:47.Money, is a satirical state of the nation tale focusing on the banking
:00:47. > :00:49.
:00:49. > :00:53.Welcome to Talking Books. Thank you. Let's start with your latest novel,
:00:53. > :00:56.Other People's Money, the story of an old private English bank and the
:00:56. > :01:06.family that own it and how they deal with the speculative folly of
:01:06. > :01:12.placing bad debts on behalf of their clients, casino banking. --
:01:12. > :01:18.bad bets. Is it for you a state of the nation novel in light of the
:01:18. > :01:22.banking crisis? Yes. I deliberately decided to write a state of the
:01:22. > :01:26.nation novel. I think a lot of contemporary novels are a state of
:01:26. > :01:32.the nation novels. I tried specifically to try to give a
:01:32. > :01:36.snapshot of Britain at a certain time. Why did you want to do that?
:01:36. > :01:43.You have tackled satire before. In Every Face I Meet, you could argue
:01:43. > :01:47.was a state of the nation novel. read a piece in the newspaper
:01:47. > :01:51.saying that there are only four people who could write a state of
:01:51. > :01:58.the nation novel. They named me as one of them and I was flattered. I
:01:58. > :02:03.could not help notice that two of the others were dead. Were you
:02:03. > :02:07.aware of others who had written about the credit crunch? David
:02:07. > :02:15.Hare's The Power Of Yes, the Enron play which did well here but not
:02:15. > :02:23.well in the United States. Were you conscious of that? Yes. I had read
:02:23. > :02:29.a few of them because I started in 2008. I saw that play. I was
:02:29. > :02:33.thinking back to the 80s crisis. And also to Victorian novels. It is
:02:33. > :02:40.true that at times of stress and crisis very good novels get written.
:02:40. > :02:43.Or novels demand to be written. I try to rise to the challenge.
:02:43. > :02:49.some respects it could be argued that you had a ready-made
:02:50. > :02:59.readership for this sort of novel. Bankers are universally reviled.
:03:00. > :03:03.
:03:03. > :03:06.There is huge antipathy towards them. You could have written any
:03:07. > :03:10.sort of novel and cast the bankers as venal. When I talked to bankers
:03:10. > :03:16.I discovered they were not hateful or corrupt. They'd just had a
:03:16. > :03:19.cultural entitlement and they thought that they deserved it.
:03:19. > :03:24.While the money was coming in, they did not question what they were
:03:24. > :03:31.doing. It seemed to be justification for them. I was not
:03:31. > :03:34.that hard on the bankers. I could have been worse. I tried to look at
:03:34. > :03:38.it from the point of view of someone who is seduced by the
:03:38. > :03:43.culture of the times and thinks these new instruments of finance
:03:43. > :03:49.are going to be wonderful for producing money out of nothing.
:03:49. > :03:53.That is how I treated the main protagonist. It struck me as ironic
:03:53. > :03:58.that this book won the 2011 Spears Award. That is a magazine whose
:03:58. > :04:01.readership is wealthy. Do you think they did not understand the satire?
:04:01. > :04:10.No. Nobody thinks you are lampooning them. They always think
:04:10. > :04:20.it is somebody else. I have written other satirical books. Even when
:04:20. > :04:22.
:04:22. > :04:31.you say all lawyers are crooks, they think, not me! Nobody has
:04:32. > :04:41.criticised it too heavily on moral grounds. They knew it was not
:04:42. > :04:42.
:04:42. > :04:46.really right but they could not stop themselves. There is a moment
:04:46. > :04:49.in there where you seem to be saying that the old way is the
:04:49. > :04:52.better way, where the man, Julian's father who is dying, he questions
:04:52. > :04:56.the whole notion of casino banking. Is that something you are conscious
:04:56. > :05:03.of, looking back at a halcyon time is something you are interested in?
:05:03. > :05:09.I do not think there ever was a halcyon time. A mythology arises
:05:09. > :05:16.and it is generally believed... If ever there was a middle England it
:05:16. > :05:19.was for a very short time. I do not think we would want to go back, if
:05:20. > :05:26.you talk about these periods that are supposed to be idyllic. But
:05:26. > :05:29.banking was simple. You lend money and you make a small profit. Then
:05:29. > :05:33.they discovered they believed they could make money out of derivatives
:05:33. > :05:43.and all kinds of things. They were deluded. Somebody said, you do not
:05:43. > :05:46.
:05:46. > :05:48.know who has been swimming naked until the tide goes out. If the
:05:48. > :05:58.recession had not happened nobody would have discovered people
:05:58. > :06:03.
:06:03. > :06:07.stealing others' money. You write about a partout a partup of people.
:06:07. > :06:11.You were on the right side of no judgement being made, although it
:06:11. > :06:14.is clear these people did wrong. That is something you do a lot in
:06:14. > :06:18.your writing. You don't want to be judgmental. You want to be
:06:18. > :06:28.empathetic as well as showing up their foibles. Do you think that is
:06:28. > :06:34.
:06:34. > :06:38.right? You should draw your own conclusions. One character says,
:06:38. > :06:48.they buy art, but they don't make art. There are alternatives to
:06:48. > :06:49.
:06:49. > :06:55.money. There is that moment when Fleur has lunch with her ex-husband,
:06:55. > :07:05.Artair MacCleod. He is a fantastic creation. He is a director but also
:07:05. > :07:10.
:07:10. > :07:14.a fantasist. He stands in front of a Cezanne painting and is truly
:07:14. > :07:17.moved by it. You are on that side. You are saying there is a nobility
:07:17. > :07:21.and heroism in the pursuit of art. Yes. Absolutely. It always strikes
:07:21. > :07:25.me as absurd there could be that many people who deserve that amount
:07:25. > :07:35.of money when down in the corners of the country people are trying to
:07:35. > :07:37.
:07:37. > :07:46.make theatre or art and getting nothing. He stands for art. He
:07:46. > :07:53.stands for the power of art, the transformative power of art. I
:07:53. > :08:03.believe that art is very important. Art and culture is how we see
:08:03. > :08:05.
:08:05. > :08:11.ourselves. The notion of material success and its potential failed
:08:11. > :08:15.rewards is something that you look at time and again in your novels.
:08:15. > :08:19.It seems to me it is to do with existentialism. Can you explain a
:08:19. > :08:29.little bit of why you have used all of those ideas in so many of your
:08:29. > :08:34.
:08:34. > :08:43.novels? I have always liked novels where characters are both worldly
:08:43. > :08:48.and have higher thoughts. I do not look at reward as a specific theme
:08:48. > :08:57.of many of my books but it strikes me as odd that there is a paper
:08:57. > :09:04.thin divide between one life and one that you could have led.
:09:04. > :09:08.Banking is such an empty business. The only way people justify it is
:09:08. > :09:10.by earning so much money. They convince themselves that they must
:09:10. > :09:20.be doing something wonderful because they're getting so much
:09:20. > :09:20.
:09:21. > :09:24.money. It is a delusion. Even outside of banking, in your other
:09:24. > :09:27.novels, so many of your characters engage in ruminations on a life and
:09:27. > :09:37.work you describe as higher thoughts and this notion of
:09:37. > :09:40.reflections. John Updike seems to be a massive influence on the way
:09:40. > :09:47.in which you deal with human character. Yes, he was a big
:09:47. > :09:53.influence and I also knew him. He said that by taking the ordinary
:09:53. > :10:03.and by close examination making them extraordinary that was his job.
:10:03. > :10:04.
:10:04. > :10:07.I think that is true. I think of myself as a realist writer. But I
:10:07. > :10:13.don't make the distinction between imagined and realist writing.
:10:13. > :10:16.Whatever you write comes from you in some way or another. John Updike
:10:16. > :10:22.had an astonishing application and honesty which I have tried to
:10:22. > :10:28.emulate. Focusing on family in particular seems to be something
:10:28. > :10:38.that you want to do. It is not just middle class but it is middle class
:10:38. > :10:38.
:10:39. > :10:42.families and the betrayals inherent in families. There is the core
:10:42. > :10:45.relationships that are always to do with betrayal or deception or
:10:45. > :10:55.secrets. Where does that come from? Do you think that gives you
:10:55. > :10:56.
:10:56. > :10:59.material for your novels? Or is there something more deep-seated?
:10:59. > :11:02.There is nothing particularly dark. But I think that most social
:11:02. > :11:10.relations and family relations are shot through with problems. My
:11:11. > :11:14.experience is that they are. I know people who have had terrible
:11:14. > :11:17.problems, probably of their own making. It is strange that the
:11:17. > :11:20.middle class is supposed to be stable and organised. They suffer
:11:20. > :11:23.as much as anybody. Do you think that writing novels is an
:11:23. > :11:27.optimistic act? I heard in an interview, you talked about sharing
:11:27. > :11:37.Isaiah Berlin's view that life largely has no meaning. I wonder if
:11:37. > :11:42.
:11:42. > :11:45.writing this novel was optimistic for you. What Berlin said, if
:11:45. > :11:50.anybody believes life has a script they are deluded. He said you have
:11:50. > :11:55.to make the best of it and live life day by day. I think that is
:11:55. > :12:03.indisputable. It is a madness to believe there is something
:12:03. > :12:08.directing us from somewhere else, in my view. I am aware that I might
:12:08. > :12:18.be in the minority. But it seems crazy. Isaiah Berlin is a great
:12:18. > :12:18.
:12:18. > :12:22.influence for other reasons. He was basically a liberal. It was a great
:12:22. > :12:32.relief when I went to South Africa and you could be a liberal. They
:12:32. > :12:36.
:12:36. > :12:39.were all Marxist. Or some other form of closed society. Tell me
:12:39. > :12:43.about your childhood in South Africa. Your father was the editor
:12:43. > :12:50.of a newspaper and because he was a liberal came across all sorts of
:12:50. > :12:55.terrible experiences. Yes. He was the editor of the Rand Daily Mail.
:12:55. > :13:00.That was the leading opposition paper. He was never in danger. They
:13:00. > :13:04.were never going to hang him or anything. But I remember at one
:13:04. > :13:14.time he had a dead dog delivered to his office. It was a liberal
:13:14. > :13:15.
:13:15. > :13:25.newspaper and they exposed some It was a liberal newspaper and they
:13:25. > :13:28.
:13:28. > :13:37.exposed some slavery on farms. As I said, I had a feeling the
:13:37. > :13:46.alternative was not to pull the lines. It was not Marxist dogma.
:13:46. > :13:52.your writing, Africa figures. But you're only novel based in Africa
:13:52. > :14:02.was White Lightning. Why have you not written more extensively about
:14:02. > :14:03.
:14:03. > :14:09.South Africa? I was forced up in the shadow of a Parkside writers --
:14:09. > :14:18.apartheid. Although I revered all three or those writers in different
:14:18. > :14:27.ways, I did not think the moral issues were that difficult. There
:14:27. > :14:32.was a simple issue of injustice. So it did not strike me as ambivalence
:14:32. > :14:42.or interesting enough and for me live is ambivalent and full of
:14:42. > :14:43.
:14:43. > :14:48.compromises. I just did not want to rides and apartheid novel. -- to
:14:48. > :14:55.write. I did write one thing but I felt queasy because it was
:14:55. > :15:01.commissioned. Our White Lightning is a post apartheid novel? It is my
:15:01. > :15:07.only apartheid novel. My mother used to say they were going to
:15:07. > :15:16.throw us into the sea one day. And I have my protagonist swimming for
:15:16. > :15:23.his life. Up our side is, on one level, very straightforward as an
:15:23. > :15:29.injustice, and on the other level it was very complex -- apartheid.
:15:29. > :15:35.The government exacerbated it deliberately. You mentioned one
:15:35. > :15:42.writer and there are similarities between one of his novels and White
:15:42. > :15:48.Lightning. There is an attempt to come to terms with a post apartheid
:15:48. > :15:56.will force South Africans who are white. You are not as bleak as he
:15:56. > :15:59.is in your outlook. No. What he was saying is that he was a lecturer
:15:59. > :16:07.and a great expose on continental literature. He was saying that if
:16:07. > :16:11.you believe in this source of culture, you better get out -- sort
:16:11. > :16:20.of culture. It is not going to happen. I made a documentary when I
:16:20. > :16:25.was talking to a director of the National Opera in Pretoria. It
:16:25. > :16:30.dawned on him that they were going to lose their grant because the
:16:30. > :16:37.government had decided it was not appropriate to pay white men in
:16:37. > :16:47.tights to sing in Italian. In a sense, that is what John had seen
:16:47. > :16:49.
:16:49. > :16:55.as a university lecturer. Our time was up. There is a debate about the
:16:55. > :17:00.humanity of South Africa, your protagonist in white lining does
:17:00. > :17:08.say there is no way that he can no the black African -- White
:17:08. > :17:13.Lightning. The post apartheid black Afrikaner sensibility is one that
:17:13. > :17:17.is still very ill at ease with their place in South Africa. They
:17:17. > :17:26.have to atone for the sins of her past by your protagonist does not
:17:26. > :17:36.seem to be going in that direction. He had been a motorcycle messenger
:17:36. > :17:37.
:17:37. > :17:42.in London. John also said that his only loyalty was a group of rural
:17:42. > :17:49.Afrikaner people. He understood the terrible things that had happened
:17:49. > :17:54.under their name. Essentially that is what he felt loyal too. I did
:17:54. > :18:00.not feel loyal to any particular group in South Africa. It is the
:18:00. > :18:10.gun and our ability that is the theme in my books -- they lack of
:18:10. > :18:12.
:18:12. > :18:16.knowing. It concerns me and I just think it is impossible these claims
:18:16. > :18:21.by white people who call themselves Africans. They can call themselves
:18:21. > :18:24.Africans if they like but they are not. It is a strange thing. I would
:18:24. > :18:32.not claim to be an African because my influences have mainly been
:18:32. > :18:40.European. I can speak about 50 words of Zulu, that is far as I got.
:18:40. > :18:46.I sympathise with Africans in South Africa but I cannot share their
:18:46. > :18:56.sensibility. That is a conceit. a love of the land? Are you drawn
:18:56. > :18:57.
:18:57. > :19:07.to that? I know from a book I wrote that everybody sees that as it did
:19:07. > :19:08.
:19:08. > :19:15.for me. The Maasai see it as a place where way you can bring up
:19:15. > :19:22.cattle -- from a book I wrote that everybody sees it differently. They
:19:22. > :19:28.see a load of huts and a very picturesque landscape. I am not
:19:28. > :19:35.free of that. If I drove through that... I did a five-day walk and
:19:35. > :19:41.it is magnificent. It is uplifting to be sold. I want to ask you about
:19:42. > :19:47.your place as a writer in this country -- to the salt. You have
:19:47. > :19:52.written 12 novels, many of which are admired usually. I get a sense
:19:52. > :19:57.you are not so a rise of that's many people talk about a lot. --
:19:57. > :20:07.not a writer. But people do seem to be talking about any more and more
:20:07. > :20:11.
:20:11. > :20:14.over the last few years. -- talking about me more. Many people have
:20:14. > :20:24.written saying very nice things about me. It is strange because I
:20:24. > :20:25.
:20:25. > :20:31.am the same age as some of these people, like Ian McEwan, and I am
:20:31. > :20:38.thought of as trailing behind them. Had a son he feel? Very bad. -- how
:20:38. > :20:43.does that make you feel? Give me a little sense of what you mean by
:20:43. > :20:50.very bad. You are very successful, you make a living out of being a
:20:50. > :20:55.writer. Is there something more that you want? Note, just more of
:20:55. > :21:05.the same -- no. Most of my books I have been happy with. That is the
:21:05. > :21:08.best you can do. I have just been a judge for the Booker Prize. I found
:21:08. > :21:17.some books very amazing and the other judges thought they were
:21:17. > :21:22.terrible. And vice-versa. There has been no Booker Prize that has been
:21:22. > :21:26.unanimous since 1969, since it started. You were only one of three
:21:26. > :21:33.judges. It was mired in controversy because one judge decided to
:21:33. > :21:40.distance herself from the wind. thought two of us were sitting high
:21:40. > :21:49.up -- the winner. She had an idea of what the prize should be -- the
:21:49. > :21:55.win. The other judge and I agreed. Do prices matter for you? Is a
:21:55. > :22:05.parcel being a successful writer? It does mean that people out there
:22:05. > :22:08.
:22:08. > :22:16.are missing -- is that part -- are listening. I have been listed twice
:22:16. > :22:20.for the Booker Prize but I have never one. I have spoken to many
:22:20. > :22:28.writers who say they do not mind about success, they just want to
:22:28. > :22:38.make the work and be an artist. Is that part of the impulse behind
:22:38. > :22:38.
:22:38. > :22:46.what you are saying? I do not think I could have much more recognition.
:22:46. > :22:52.Two of my books are becoming film scripts at the moment. I have
:22:52. > :23:00.achieved a fair amount. But I agree. As a writer, you have to be to see