Tell us about your new novel, Eden’s Shore
It starts off with an Irish man called Angel Kelly heading to Brazil to set up a utopian commune in the late 1700s. Then it follows that character’s, let’s say, intention rather than that character.
It features an Irish man stranded in a Spanish colony in Latin America. How complicit was the average Irish person in colonialism. Or were they mostly victims?
In terms of the Irish, we have gone everywhere and done everything. We have been among the best and the worst, from any which way that you look at it. We’re excellent victims and we’ve done almost every other thing you can imagine.
Your debut novel, Nobber (2019), was longlisted for the Desmond Elliott Award and shortlisted for the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize. Tell us about it
It’s set in 1348. It’s about a young noble travelling through Leinster trying to buy up property devalued by the plague. He comes into Nobber and meets someone who might have had a similar idea some time before. A deadly stand-off ensues. Real High Noon stuff.
Both books are historical fictions. Is that significant?
I’m interested in change. I’m also interested in people’s ideas about what change means. European literature has an immensely rich history and I like to be able to participate in that history in different ways. This has led me to writing about different eras.
How important is humour? Our reviewer admired your “noir whimsy and highfalutin’ bawdiness”. Can it come, though, at the cost of emotional depth?
Well, emotional depth can come at the heavy cost of humour. Anyway, the figure of fun becomes tragic, then his tragic nature becomes laughable, then our laughter turns to tears. Then our tears turn into tears of joy. Bla bla. That’s life. I’m sure Shakespeare said something about it.
Did writing about the Black Death prepare you for Covid?
It added two years to my Covid experience.
Your debut collection, Hostages (2016), published when you were just 25, was likened to Father Ted scripted by Philip K Dick.
That does sound good, doesn’t it?
What’s a bigger influence, sci-fi or magical realism?
Magical realism is neither here nor there. I love many Latin American writers. Gabriel García Márquez, Juan Rulfo, Julio Cortázar, Antonio di Benedetto, but I even just think of sci-fi and my heart starts racing. Philip K Dick, Kim Stanley Robinson, Jules Verne, Ursula le Guin. My God, what an adventure!
You were active in opposing water charges and the housing crisis. Is fiction a good vehicle for political thought?
No.
You won the inaugural Penny Dreadful Novella Prize for The Hierophants, in part a satire of literary academia. How useful do you find reviews?
If Frank Kermode had ever written about me, even if he had dismissed me in a few passing words, I would have framed it and put it on the wall. With Eden’s Shore, I lived it inside and outside for years now. Everything I was for 30 years led me there. I know what it means to me. A reviewer can’t help me with this one.
Which projects are you working on?
A romance novel set in Paris in 1917.
Have you ever made a literary pilgrimage?
I was in LA with Ian Maleney two years ago and we went to the alley behind Winkie’s Diner featured in Mulholland Drive. Then we visited Fred Madison’s house from Lost Highway. Finally, we had a milkshake in Bob’s Big Boy Burbank where David Lynch wrote Blue Velvet. He saw Frank Booth come in one day and stand at the counter.
What is the best writing advice you have heard?
You know Tuco in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly says, ‘When you have to shoot, shoot; don’t talk.’ That’s good.
Who do you admire the most?
Colin Farrell. Colin Farrell, if you are reading this, I have a script I want to send you. Colin Farrell, if you aren’t reading this, the answer is my mother.
You are supreme ruler for a day. Which law do you pass or abolish?
Iron-clad Ireland’s military neutrality. Turn 50 per cent of Ireland into a wildlife sanctuary. Reintroduce wolves. Remove fire exit lights from next to cinema screens. Ban holding your phone above your head at gigs. Install free water points across the cities and countryside. There’s more than a few chemicals in the food I’d like banned, too. Agribusiness needs an enormous reform, including what we are allowed to import. Massively increase the number of aircraft in the Irish Air Corps. Make me a captain. Legalise duels.
Which current book, film and podcast would you recommend?
Wendy Erskine’s The Benefactors. The film Anora. I’ve yet to listen to a podcast I haven’t ended up despising after a few hours.
Which public event affected you most?
The World Cup, always.
The most remarkable place you have visited?
The sea. When you can’t see any land in any direction.
Your most treasured possession?
Sometimes people passing through your life give you things. That’s all you’re getting out of me.
What is the most beautiful book that you own?
That first English edition of 2666 translated by Natasha Wimmer. I don’t even know if it’s beautiful, but that summer I read it, it was like approaching the Holy Grail. It just lay there in the sunlight by the window, and every time you’d touch it you’d think to yourself, ‘I am not worthy, Señor.’
Which writers, living or dead, would you invite to your dream dinner party?
What writers have to say to me, they say in their books; otherwise what’s the point? Saying that, I have several good writer friends with whom I enjoy taking the odd glass of port.
The best and worst things about where you live?
I am like a tropical plant wilting in the stony grey soil of Monaghan. My biological structure requires light and heat to flourish. The best thing, obviously, is Irish people.
What is your favourite quotation?
I want two. Jiddu Krishnamurthi said, ‘Observe without choice.’ Marvin Hagler said, ‘War. That’s what’s on my mind.’
Who is your favourite fictional character?
Hans from the Grimm brothers fairy-tale Hans im Glück.
A book to make me laugh?
Once you’ve eaten your Eden’s Shore vegetables April 10th, then you can have your JP McHugh Fun and Games April 24th.
A book that might move me to tears?
If it’s tears you’re after, Thomas Hardy’s your man.
Eden’s Shore is published by John Murray on April 10th
