Best Of: Novelist Douglas Stuart / ‘Half Man’ Actor Richard Gadd
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
This week on the NPR Politics Podcast, President Trump has never been more unpopular and the midterms are now less than six months away.
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From WHYY in Philadelphia, I'm Terry Gross with Fresh Air Weekend. Today, writer Douglas Stewart, like the main character in his Booker Prize-winning novel called Shuggy Bane, Stewart grew up in Glasgow, working class, queer, and with a mother addicted to alcohol. His first career was designing for Calvin Klein and Banana Republic, from outerwear to underwear.
Sometimes when I'm in an audience now and I sort of look out and I feel a little bit nervous, I have a joke to myself. I think, how many people in this audience have worn the underwear that you designed?
Stuart has a new novel. Later, Richard Gad, creator and star of Baby Reindeer. His new series, Half Man, is about two boys who become brothers when their mothers fall in love. They spend the next 30 years trying to survive each other. And David Bianculli reviews the latest adaptation of Lord of the Flies. That's coming up on Fresh Air Weekend. This is Fresh Air Weekend. I'm Terry Gross. You may have read my guest's books. You may have worn the clothes he designed. Douglas Stewart's first novel, Shuggy Bane, won the Booker Prize, which is one of the world's top literary awards. Much of it was written when Stewart was working in the fashion industry, designing clothes for popular brands like Calvin Klein and Banana Republic.
Stuart wouldn't have predicted any of this from what his life was like growing up in a working-class neighborhood in Glasgow, Scotland in the 80s. He was raised by a single mother who was addicted to alcohol. Things weren't much better at school where he was relentlessly bullied. When he came to understand that he was gay, he didn't know anyone else who was. The novel Shuggie Bain tells a story very similar to Stuart's own childhood— Stewart has described his second novel, Young Mungo, as a story about the dangers of first love between two young working-class men in Glasgow, and about masculinity, conformity, and falling in love. In our book critic Maureen Corrigan's review, she wrote, "...it's hard to imagine a more disquieting and powerful work of fiction will be published any time soon about the perils of being different."
Douglas Stewart has a new novel called John of John that explores themes of faith, obligation, and how isolating secrets can be. It's set on a fictional island in Scotland's Hebrides in a very old-fashioned conservative community of weavers. There are two Johns in the story, a father and his son.
What themes does Douglas Stuart explore in his new novel 'John of John'?
The son is known as Cal. Cal has just graduated textile school in Glasgow and reluctantly returns home when his father insists he needs Cal's help to take care of Cal's sick grandmother. Cal is gay and keeps it a secret from everyone, including his father. But as we learn early in the story, the father, who is the deacon of his church, is also secretly gay. Father and son are keeping the same secret from each other. Douglas Stewart, welcome to Fresh Air and congratulations on your new book. Can you describe how you landed on the premise that both the father and son are gay and they're not only keeping it a secret from everyone else, they're keeping it a secret from each other?
Yes. I mean, I am a Scotsman who grew up in Glasgow, but I had never been to the Outer Hebrides before. You know, they're quite far from the mainland and it takes some effort to get there. But in 2019, when I was thinking about writing a new novel, I decided I was going to go to the Archipelago of Islands and just explore it and see if a story emerged. And I realized that every little settlement I went to, that when I was talking to someone, I would sit at a kitchen table and have tea and pancakes or whatever they baked for me.
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–2:56
2
What themes does Douglas Stuart explore in his new novel 'John of John'?
2:56–9:47
3
How did Douglas Stuart's upbringing influence his writing?
9:47–15:03
4
What is the significance of the relationship between the two Johns in 'John of John'?
15:03–15:32
5
What are the major themes in Richard Gadd's new series 'Half Man'?
15:32–15:43
6
How does Richard Gadd's 'Half Man' address toxic masculinity?
15:43–18:37
7
What personal experiences shaped Richard Gadd's storytelling?
18:37–48:07
Speakers
6 identifiedMore from Fresh Air
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