In this podcast I get to interview a dear friend from my childhood in the colourful 70s. Norman is now a doctor, pathologist and a writer whose new book is about to be released. We reminisce about the past and he explains the story behind his grotesquely dark and potentially disturbing literature offering.

In Jessica's gems she uses her curiosity about the English language to pull out some of the language from the interview and asks questions in order that I give some insights into terms like: To be trumped, to be freaked out, to be privileged and many more.

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Transcription of Interview:

Just give us a little intro into where, you know, where the passion started. So for example, if we spoke about, if we spoke about history, I mean, where, where did the passion, where did that sort of come from? When I was a young boy, I, I used to be very interested in castles and things. And I remember my dad taking me to Dover castle for the first time. And that was, you know, really fascinating. And it began to make me feel this kind of connection with the past and wanting to know more about these, these artifacts and these buildings, particularly. And then I suppose from there, it kind of evolved into other areas of history that I learned at school. And I, I was always very, you know, very absorbed by history and it said, it's a strange one history because you know, it can really turn some people off. Speaker 1 (00:55): And I remember some people in my class being, you know, pretty much, well, you know, why are we learning this? This is complete waste of time and I don't need to know this, but for me it was about, um, a connection with the past. And I think having that understanding of the past, especially in terms of the chronology of the past, which I think is seriously lacking in schools these days, these days you tend to pick up a subject like,I don't know the Spanish Armada, Royal queen queen Victoria, but it's not really in any context. And, you know, you are someone when Magna Carta was signed or when the Spanish Armada happened. They they've got no idea. And I think for me, it was, it was about that sense of, yeah, things have happened over the last few millennia and we are basically living in a world at the moment that is just so much, it's so much entwined in the past. Speaker 1 (01:46): Everything we do, everything we, we say is all about other people, the developed language, the clothes we wear, how would, you know, how would we be here today? You know, talking to you, John, without people in the past have invented electricity and you know, all that kind of stuff. And for me to understand the past gives me not only a sense of orientation in the present, but it helps me to certainly as a writer, empathize with the characters and the backdrop to my novels, that help flesh out the characters, but also give it that kind of realism, not a realism that I can prove because I was never there, but a realism that feels real to me. And I think that's, that's the most important thing for me. It's it's can I, can I get inside this character and almost be there in a time machine, but not really. Speaker 1 (02:42): Hopefully my readers will be able to experience that as well, you know, go into that world that I, that I feel is, is real and, and see if they feel the same. Okay. Well, I mean your, your another passion, you became a doctor, um, long, long time ago now, but yeah, doctor, so you obviously developed an interest that deep interest in, in medicine at some point, knowing you as a boy, it wasn't a question of that, that you wanted to be a doctor from day one. No, absolutely not. I think for me, and it may be the same for other people, but particularly me, I even at school, I had no particular area where I said, you know, I must do this even up to my A levels, John, I was kind of, well, I'd like to do science A levels, but actually I love history so much and I love English so much. Speaker 1 (03:36): I must do those. So I ended up doing a kind of mixture of sciences and arts subjects at A level, but it wasn't really until my second year of a levels that I thought, you know what I think I want to do medicine. I felt that my, my interests were developing, particularly in the kind of biological sciences. I had a fascination for, uh, particularly physiology and the anatomy of the human body. I really wanted to kind of drill down on the fabric of the human body and really just, you know, just explore it like a new planet almost. And of course, very few degrees can allow you to do that apart from medicine medicine. Certainly when I trained, I felt very privileged because people would give their bodies to medical science and we were able to dissect these bodies over, over the course of the first two years and basically through their sacrifice, we could learn, as I say that the fabric of the human body. Speaker 1 (04:35): And I think for me, that was a massive, massive privilege for me. And also something that I'd always wanted to learn when it came to a human being. You can imagine this is a completely different sense of, awe for what you are allowed to do with this person. And knowing that this person given their body for that was, was a massive privilege for me. And I'll never forget that that's something that an experience that I've never had is, is basically having a, a dead body, a cadaver, in front of me and then being able to cut and probe and dissect, you know, it, uh, that must be, absolutely amazing. So I think, yeah, I think it was amazing for me, John. I think others, certainly other people in my year did not like it. And I think you'll find that it depends on the personality of the person, but, um, you know, it does, it can either make you feel completely freaked out, um, and almost, you know, scared to even go near it or it, or it can draw you in. Speaker 1 (05:42): And for me, there was a mixture of both. I obviously was tentative and scared to make that first incision in something that was actually a living human being only weeks before, but I just felt, you know, this person has given their body to me and my colleagues, therefore it was only right that we, we use that body to further the next generation of doctors and, and carry on with that. I think if we, if we'd all have rejected the body, the Cadaver, as you say, that would be an insult to the person to the left, you know? Yeah, I totally get that. But how did you react? Um, coz obviously in the human body, even with my rudimentary knowledge, there's things that would turn and smells that would turn most people's stomachs. Um, how did you deal with, with getting through those barriers or, or was it something it just was easy for you? Speaker 1 (06:39): It wasn't easy. Um, I must just explain two things. Really. There's a difference between doing a postmortem examination, which is basically an examination of someone after death, where the body has not been in any way tampered with. So the body is literally refrigerated until you do the post-mortem. So then when you do the examination, these smells and things that you talk about, they can be difficult to deal with. I agree. And I remember my first post-mortem as a medical student, which wasn't until my third year. And that was a completely different experience from the, from the days of my anatomy. Anatomy, when I was learning was performed on a cadaver that had been already embalmed. So these bodies had been embalmed in formalin. You would essentially access one of the main veins in the leg and then you, using a pump system, uh, perfuse the entire body with a solution of formalin. Speaker 1 (07:41): And that fixes the tissue stops it from, from rotting. So it was a long time and there's no way you could do that without having some sort of, uh, you know, preservation, the old way of doing it, of course, was to literally pick all the body, either in vinegar or more commonly alcohol. I know that when Nelson died at Trafalgar, obviously that's quite a long way away from England and he had to come back for his state funeral, the sailors put him in a barrel of Brandy, I think, or some sort of spirit. And that's how he, he was preserved until he came back to England. But yes. So with, with regards to the dissection, yes, there are smells, but it's much more about a smell of formalin, which is a unique smell you get used to after a while, but it isn't necessarily an unpleasant smell. Speaker 1 (08:34): Okay. So coming to your, your third passion that I wanted to introduce to everyone today, uh, or making them aware is as literature as your writer and also language I'll put those two together. Yeah, I think can probably recall John, when we were both young boys back in the seventies, we both had this drive in us to, to write. And I remember very keenly that both me and you used to keep these little notebooks and we'd be scribbling away day and night writing these fantastical stories. And don't forget, this was at a time when it wasn't particularly, I mean, it, wasn't very common for a boy to do this. I don't think, but we seem to have this desire to write. And I remember at school, one of my primary school teachers telling my mum that Norman, he just writes so much and he just wants to put everything down. Speaker 1 (09:29): But of course he hasn't learned the grammar and the spelling yet. So I was writing this stuff, thinking it was all fantastic, but of course I hadn't learned the discipline of grammar and spelling and punctuation and everything. It was more like a flow of consciousness, but it made sense to me at the time. And unfortunately for me, I really regret it, but I don't have these books anymore. You know, I don't know where they went when they went into, you know, into the loft and then subsequently thrown out. Um, I don't know, but to have had a look back at those and I'm sure you're the same, John, I'm sure you don't have yours either. Do you? No. Do you know what? Most of the, most of the things that I had in, let's say the golden era of my past, my childhood has all gone. Speaker 1 (10:11): Norm, it's all gone, all the toys, all the matchbox toys, the action men, the things that are so iconic of the seventies, you know, star wars figures. You had a lot more than I did, but it's all gone. But I think my sister has something. I blame my mother for my loss of various things. Cause she didn't have much. Um, I mean she was a wonderful woman and have many qualities, but sentimentality wasn't one of them. I remember one, one day coming home and she'd thrown all of my model kits away, not in a kind of, not in a nasty, vicious way. It was at, it was the fact that I was growing up my model kits that I'd had as a child. And you probably remember my monster modeling kits and other things had all been moved into, um, a drawer and they're all collecting dust. Speaker 1 (10:58): And she probably just thought, well, no one doesn't want these anymore. Throw them out. And of course at the time I probably didn't want them either. But now when you look back on them, you think, oh, I just wish I'd kept those because that was part of my growing up. And there's a lot of sentimentality there. I had got some of my model kits, but not all of them. And I think for both of us and we speak for many people of our generation, John yeah. Things like, you know, multiple kits, star wars, figures, old bikes, the old Boxer, and Grifter from the past, you know, all that. Well, that kind of stuff. We kind of yearn for that. And that's why there's such a market for this in, in all these, you know, websites and auctions because people want to connect back to their past particularly toys.