Will Self
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What was Will Self's childhood like?
Gather ye rosebuds while ye may. There's a new guest waiting with quite a lot to say. So I'm going to shut up and say welcome to another episode of Rosebud. We do indeed have a very special guest for you. Cue the music. They're ready.
Hello, I'm Giles Brandreth, and a warm welcome to another episode of Rosebud. I always say every guest is special. This one is extra special to me because I have been reading his work now for, well, since the early 1990s. And I love the way he writes. I love his way with words. I love the way he writes. I love the way he plays with ideas. I love the fact that he is a satiric writer, but also can touch the heart. He is Will Self, and he's a controversial writer to many. He's been up for every award that you can imagine. Booker Prize, Whitbread Novel of the Year, you name it, he's been there. I've just been reading, I think, the 20th novel by him that I've read. It's called The Quantity Theory of Morality.
I think that's probably inspired by his first big breakout novel, which was The Quantity Theory of Insanity back in 1991. This is an episode, I suppose, that should begin with a bit of a trigger warning because there's going to be sex, drugs and rock and roll. Well, no, certainly drugs, certainly sex. I don't think there is much rock and roll. There's a roller coaster life. So there's so much packed into this conversation. But here is a very funny, I think, very wise, very interesting character. please do if you haven't read his latest i do thoroughly recommend it i haven't got to the end of it yet i'm halfway through it's made me laugh out loud at times it's called the quantity theory of morality it's published by grove the hardback is out now you'll certainly find it fascinating welcome to rosebud cue the music
William Woodard Self, born 26 September 1961. Yes. So far, so good. What, have you always been called Will, for short?
No, it's self-adopted. My father, being of the grey flannel trouser tweed jacket profession, called me Little Willie, which was a sobriquet, interestingly, in the playgrounds of the 1970s I was keen to lose.
We'll come on to that in a moment. Yes.
So I called myself Will rather than William. I thought it was dashing and Shakespearean. And it is.
It's a great name. Will Self is a great name.
I've always been interested in nominative determinism for obvious reasons. I love Stoppard's play Jumpers for that reason, which has an obsession with nominative determinism and philosophy. And of course, my mother was an abject Freudian. She'd been in an analysis when she was pregnant with me, with Anthony Storr. So... The idea of self-will came at me from so many different domains as a young person. The most signature name event for me, though, wasn't when, as a child, we were in a hotel in New York and William Self was paged because he was the producer of Batman.
LAUGHTER
But actually, when a friend of mine called O'Shaughnessy when I was in my teens said, there's nothing that remarkable about your name. There's more of you in the phone book than there are O'Shaughnessy's. And actually, the London phone book is something we've all lost because it allowed you to get a feeling for demography instantly. You can flip through it. And we went to the book, and indeed there were more selves than O'Shaughnessy's. And that appalled me. There were only about 20 selves.
But that phone book was fascinating because there were only five Brandreths, I do remember. Right, well, there you go. But there were two or three pages of people called Smelly.
Yes, many smellies.
And we did. Did you ever phone them up?
Yes.
And say, are you smelly?
The person who most liked phoning them up, he won't like being reminded of it, was a childhood friend of mine who's called Matthew Freud, who was very fond of persecuting Mr Smelly.
LAUGHTER Supposedly being called Freud, he had a licence for it.
Well, that was the argument, self and Freud calling smelly. LAUGHTER
okay now let's begin at the beginning um will self uh born 26 september 1961 i have to ask you what is your very first memory i think it's almost certainly i've thought about this a lot there are two very early memories and they're similar but they're in so they're from probably when i was around one or one and all that's very early yeah and what what's the one that you think is the earliest
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What was Will Self's childhood like?
0:00–8:50
2
How did Will Self's adolescence influence his writing?
8:50–13:17
3
What experiences shaped Will Self's perspective on drugs?
13:17–16:47
4
How did Will Self navigate his early career in journalism?
16:47–20:57
5
What impact did Will Self's health challenges have on his life?
20:57–27:00
6
What are Will Self's thoughts on love and relationships?
27:00–30:56
7
How does Will Self define satire and its purpose?
30:56–36:55
8
What insights does Will Self share about his latest book?
36:55–1:06:29