Glorious Exploits is one of the most original and brilliant Irish debuts in years. How would you sum it up?
Thank you very much. The book is set in 412 BC Sicily during the aftermath of Athens’ disastrous invasion of Sicily, after which thousands of the would-be invaders were thrown into a quarry and left to die. We know from Plutarch that some of the defeated Athenians survived because their Syracusan captors would give extra rations in exchange for quotes from Euripides’s plays. My novel starts from here and follows two unemployed, theatre-obsessed Syracusan potters who decide to put on Medea in the quarry with an all-star cast of Athenian prisoners.
Your father is from Libya. Did that Mediterranean heritage influence your interest in the region?
Oddly enough, it didn’t. I first became fascinated by ancient Greece as a child before I had even realised Libya’s proximity or its incredible classical heritage. However, the upheaval in Libya in recent years probably did play into why I was drawn to the aftermath of violent conflict as a subject for a novel.
Although the book has quite a dark subject matter, it is at times also highly comedic. Is that your style?
Humour is definitely important for me, both in life and writing. It also struck me that, although humour was a huge part of the classics – Aristophanes’s plays often read like something out of Monthy Python – the popular conception of the classics is as something relatively sombre. I thought trying to merge these two traditions would be a truer reflection of classical Greek culture.
The novel’s narrator, Lampo, sounds like someone from contemporary Dublin, as do many of the characters. Why did you choose to render these ancient characters’ voices in this way?
The intention was to jolt the reader with the unexpected, but it went deeper: ancient Sicily had been colonised a few hundred years previous to the period my novel begins, and Hiberno-English was a way of conveying this sense of the ancient Greek world being a hybrid place with lots of contested identities and cultures. Contemporary because these people were contemporary to themselves.
How did you research it?
I studied history and classics, so I had a background in the subject. I visited Sicily and Greece. Finally, I read pretty much everything I could about the period. Particularly works written by the ancient Greeks: Herodotus, Thucydides, Sappho, and all of the extant comedies and tragedies. I wanted to immerse myself in the mindset of those living in the period and then set the texts aside and write the book. Even though I did a lot of research, I wanted to wear it lightly so that the book never included details simply because I’d researched them. Everything needed to be integral to the story and the voice of Lampo.
What writers or books influenced the novel?
Writers like Melville, John Fante, Sean O’Casey, Hilary Mantel and Mary Renault were all important. In addition, cinema was an influence. Directors like Kurosawa, the Coen Brothers and Sergio Leone. They are all masters at showing you the familiar in an unfamiliar way, and I wanted to approach the classical world so that everything was grounded in historical research yet utterly distinct from other depictions of the period.
Which projects are you working on?
I’m deep into the next book. I always prefer not to go into much detail on a work in progress, but my second novel is also historical, although it depicts a much later period and is more epic in scope.
Have you ever made a literary pilgrimage?
I’ve undertaken a number of them. I lived in Paris for years, and while I was there, I tracked down the house where Joyce completed Ulysses; Orwell’s tenement from Down and Out in Paris and London; Samuel Beckett’s local pub; and quite a few more.
What is the best writing advice you have heard?
You can’t improve what you haven’t written.
Which current book, film and podcast would you recommend?
I really loved Claire Kilroy’s Soldier Sailor last year. I recently rewatched an old favourite, Barry Lyndon, which is astonishing. I’d recommend that to anyone who hasn’t seen it.
Your most treasured possession?
I own an Athenian tetradrachm coin, which is almost 2,500 years old. They minted a huge number of these coins to fund the Peloponnesian war and build the Parthenon. I love the idea that it very conceivably could have been used by Socrates to do the weekly shop.
What is the most beautiful book that you own?
My brother collects rare books, and he gifted me two books I especially love. The first is a signed first edition of Muhammad Ali’s autobiography, and the second is a nearly 100-year-old first edition of John Barleycorn, Jack London’s fascinating memoir on drinking.
Which writers, living or dead, would you invite to your dream dinner party?
Euripides, the Brontës, Dostoevsky, Hilary Mantel, Roberto Bolano and Joyce. The language barrier might be a problem, though.
Who is your favourite fictional character?
Don Quixote.
A book to make me laugh?
The Road to Los Angeles by John Fante.
A book that might move me to tears?
Brotherhood of the Grape by John Fante. As might be evident, I really love John Fante. Though fairly unknown, he was an utterly brilliant and unique writer, a good reminder of the dice roll of literary history.
