Will’s recent talk for the Institute of Art and Ideas’ annual philosophy and music festival, HowTheLightGetsIn.
How to Live a More Creative Life
Will Self will be giving an hour-long talk for the How To Academy in a livestream at 6.30pm on Wednesday July 29 on the subject of creativity. For tickets and further details, visit the How To Academy website here.
A Point of View: Legacy Bottle Opener
For his latest A Point of View on BBC Radio 4, Will Self discusses how the pandemic has affected our views of inheritance. Listen here.
A new Will Self short story
“It’s usually a mistake for a fiction writer to rush into print with a story that takes flight, imaginatively, from events that are still underway, and which are affecting large numbers of people. In the case of the Covid-19 pandemic, this injunction to keep out would seem to be as strident as the black-and-yellow striped tape swagged about a crime scene.
“What moved me to nonetheless ignore all warnings and respond fictionally was twofold: an editor who I deeply respect – Alex Bilmes at British Esquire – asked me to; and I already had an embryonic tale, which, once I began considering the matter, extended into my fervid psyche, like the lengthening protein ‘spike’ on a coronavirus virion.
HowTheLightGetsIn Online Festival 2020, May 22-25
Will is going to be appearing in a debate, The End of the Whitewash, with Adjoa Andoh, Kehinde Andrews and Joanna Kavenna on Saturday May 23 at 7.45pm at the HowTheLightGetsIn festival. Visit here for details and tickets.
“We celebrate diversity, and in the arts many support colour blind casting. From the film The Personal History of David Copperfield to the musical Hamilton, stories are cast to reflect the racial diversity of our culture. But critics argue that, far from being progressive, such practices in fact paper over the racist Victorian society of Dickens’s novels and the white colonial history of America. Should we applaud the overcoming of historical accuracy in favour of racially blind representation, and ignore race as a relevant characteristic in all circumstances? Or is colour blindness a liberal mistake – a dangerous denial of racial realities, and of the long history of white supremacy?”
Trials and Tribulations: Will Self teaches Franz Kafka
Will presents a guide to the work and thought of Kafka for the How to Academy online tomorrow night at 6.30pm BST. Tickets are free but you can make a donation. This is now available to watch on the How to Academy’s YouTube channel:
Great Apes, a play
JG Ballard’s prescience and the pandemic
Will is going to be on the Today programme on Radio 4 this morning at 8.50am discussing JG Ballard and the coronavirus lockdown. You can listen to the segment here at the 2hr 53min mark.
Will Self summer 2020 events
Will has a couple of appearances coming up, first at a Telepoetics event to discuss the theme of “Communications and Phone” at the Dana Research Centre and Library at the Science Museum in London on 27 May, 10times.com/telepoetics-symposium and then at the Idler Festival on 10-12 July.
Walking to Paris
Will has written about walking to Paris for his latest New European column, which can be read here.
