BookBlast Podcast

Michèle Roberts is the author of twelve highly-acclaimed novels, including The Looking Glass and Daughters of the House which won the W.H. Smith Literary Award and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. She has also published poetry and short stories, and is Emeritus Professor of Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature, and a member of PEN and of The Society of Authors.

Topics: Born a twin. Growing up in Edgware outside London; summer holidays in Etretat, Normandy; Roman Catholic schooling and rebellion; becoming a writer and being published by The Womens Press and Virago culture and creative freedom in the 1970s and 1980s; feminism then and now; the influence of biculturalism; the shock of rejection, learning and rebuilding from it.

Title focus: Negative Capability: A Diary of Surviving, published 28 May – available from www.sandstonepress.com

Recorded by telephone on the eve of the Covid 19 Lockdown 

Presented by Georgia de Chamberet | Produced by Rupert Such

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Narisa Chakrabongse, the founder and CEO of River Books, is the editor of the Oxford River Books English-Thai Dictionary. Chakrabongse Villas, the family home, is a small boutique hotel in Bangkok. I caught up with her some months ago when she was in town, to talk about her unusual Thai-Russian-British background, being a foreigner living in a strange land and, of course, River Books.

Produced by BookBlast.

Presented by G de Chamberet

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Keith Anderson, known as Bob Andy, talks about his life and times in a rare and exclusive interview with Georgia de Chamberet.

Best known in the UK for the track recorded with Marcia Griffiths "Young, Gifted and Black" (1970), he is widely regarded as "one of reggae's most influential songwriters," Wikipedia. The conversation takes in his childhood in Kingston, Maxfield Park children's home, Kingston Parish Church choir and Tyrone Evans. The Paragons. Studio One. His first solo hit record (1967) "I've Got to Go Back Home" was followed by "Desperate Lover", "Feeling Soul", "Unchained", and "Too Experienced". Composing songs for other reggae artists, including "I Don't Want to See You Cry" for Ken Boothe, and "Feel Like Jumping", "Truly", and "Melody Life" for Marcia Griffiths. He is best known for "Young, Gifted and Black" recorded with Marcia Griffiths in the early 1970s. Trojan. Working as a producer in London and recording with Mad Professor. Moving to Miami. Several of his hits in the late 1960s, and his 1992 hit, "Fire Burning", are regarded as reggae standards and have been covered several times by other artists.

REC: 00:57:42 minutes | A BookBlast® Production

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Taking 7 years to research and write, King of the World: The Life of Louis XIV by Philip Mansel (Allen Lane, 11 July) is a riveting read and set to become the definitive historical biography of Europe's longest-reigning monarch.

How is it that great leaders can delude themselves that they are working for the greater good, but engage in behavior that is morally wrong? This conundrum lies at the heart of this historical biography. The early life of Louis XIV, the Fronde tax rebellion, fleeing Paris. Crowned king at 22. War and pushing the French frontier north and east. Globalism, colonial expansion and mercantilism. Cruel persecution of the Hugenots after 1678. Rivalries between European countries. The complex, tense relationship of France and England, close family links Stuarts and Bourbons, on a war footing after 1688. The development and expansion of Versailles from being a hunting lodge to a palace still used today by French presidents to impress foreign visitors like Vladimir Putin. Attracting 7-8 million visitors a year it is the second most visited place in the world after the Forbidden City. Louis XIV and culture: André Charles Boulle, Molière, Racine, Boileau, La Fontaine, Lully, Le Brun, Rigaud, Bossuet, Le Vau, Charles Claude Perrault, Le Nôtre. Stupendous parties even by today's standards. Bling on another level. Power dressing, pomp and pageantry, beginnings of the fashion and luxury trade. Louis XIV and his women: the queen and his mistresses; Madame de Montespan and Madame de Maintenon. The Affair of the Poisons involving love potions, sorcerers, astrologers, plots and intrigue. A day in the Life of Louis XIV . . . and more.

Produced by BookBlast.

Presented by G de Chamberet

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Last week, thousands of protesters paralysed parts of central London, blockading four landmarks in the capital in an attempt to force the government to take action on the escalating climate crisis. Dom Goetz gave a succinct fifteen minute roundup of what faces us all if emergency action is not taken NOW. Inertia and denial will lead to irreversible climate breakdown and mass extinction.

Recorded LIVE by G de Chamberet for BookBlast® on Waterloo Bridge, 20.4.2019

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Exclusive interview with Maggie Gee, author of fifteen books, thirteen of which are novels, including her latest, Blood, which is published by Fentum Press.

Maggie Gee talks to Georgia de Chamberet about being born to working-class parents and climbing into an uneasy place between classes; winning a major open scholarship to Somerville College, Oxford where she did an MA in English literature and an MLitt on Surrealism in England; breaking into the publishing game; being selected as of the original Granta 20 Best of Young British Novelists in 1983; why there is still such reticence on the part of the dominant ‘white’ literary establishment to address, through literature, the tensions of race and class in contemporary British society; co-founding the “Empathy and Writing” cross-disciplinary research group at Bath Spa University; and much more besides.

A BookBlast® Production

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To celebrate the Chinese New Year of the Pig 2019, Paper Republic has launched its 2018 roundup of the most recent publications of English translations from Chinese. Its co-founder, Nicky Harman, is a leading light of the translation community and promoter of Chinese literature and culture. She was interviewed for The BookBlast® Diary in 2016 and Xu Xiaobin's Crystal Wedding reviewed.

Our conversation about writing from a non-English speaking world that is 4,834 miles away from the UK takes in the dark side of socialism and government censorship, what strengths are drawn by Chinese writers from the richness of their cultural background and national identity, issues faced by translators, Chinese women writers, sex and violence in contemporary Chinese literature, the unique aspects of contemporary Chinese literature, the growing popularity of science fiction and martial arts fiction in the West, and much more. For more info, check out our 'Spotlight' feature 'Playing Chinese Whispers with Nicky Harman' at www.bookblast.com/blog

Presented by Georgia de Chamberet | A BookBlast® Production rec, 14.02.2019 | 56.30 minutes

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A BookBlast 10x10 Tour LIVE event from Westbank, under the Westway, London W10 (15.11.2018) Feat. Kit Caless, publisher, Influx Press (chair), an independent publisher founded in 2012 based in London. Influx is committed to publishing innovative and challenging fiction, poetry and creative non-fiction from across the UK and beyond. www.influxpress.com

WITH Elizabeth Briggs from Saqi Books which publishes quality general interest and academic books on North Africa and the Middle East. www.saqibooks.com

AND Susan Curtis from Istros Books which publishes translated literature from the Balkans and South-East Europe. www.istrosbooks.com Topics: How #indiepubs who are regularly winning prizes play such an important role in the cultural ecosystem; translation, rigid mindsets and choosing to publish books written without market trends in mind; the importance of buying books directly from publishers' websites; how best to access buyers at the major bookselling chains deciding on what and how much to purchase; discounts; the lack of book publicity in the 'traditional' press which is ironic given the growing demand for world literature and eclectic, non-generic writing. The audience of publishing consultants, book distributors, bloggers, indie film makers, readers and writers questioned the way Amazon goes after publisher profit margins with crippling consequences for indies, and emphasized the importance of book blogs.

Presented by Georgia de Chamberet | Produced by Ben Fiagbe.

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A BookBlast 10x10 Tour LIVE event from Waterstones Manchester (08.11.2018) Feat. Michael Schmidt, publisher, Carcanet (poetry) chair. Carcanet was conceived at Pin Farm, South Hinksey, Oxford, in 1969 by Peter Jones, Gareth Reeves and Michael Schmidt. In 2000 it was named the Sunday Times millennium Small Publisher of the Year.

WITH Poet, Jenny Lewis, who teaches poetry at Oxford University.

AND London-born poet, Jane Draycott, who lives in Oxfordshire and is a tutor on postgraduate writing programmes at Oxford University and the University of Lancaster.

Topics: The launch of Carcanet's new classics series; revisioning the classics through women's eyes; Jenny Lewis describes the oldest written story (in Sumerian cuneiform) loosely based on the historical King Gilgamesh who ruled Mesopotamia (modern-day Iraq) in 2700 BC; how the epic of Gilgamesh was changed as society and culture became more patriarchal, for example godesses who had huge power were demoted or turned into gods; momentum is a key component of the epic narrative; Henrik Ibsen's version; public readings of the infamous sex scene over 6 days and 7 nights; Jane Draycott describes 'Pearl', one of the poems in the unique manuscript which includes 'Sir Gawain and the Green Knight'; a meditative, perfected piece with one single narrator; the figure of the lost infant girl, the lost pearl; how the manuscript in The British Library displays it as a work which speaks to us today as a very powerful exploration of the psychology of grief and bereavement; continuum of the idea of the afterlife; readings with audience participation. Title focus: 'Gilgamesh' and 'Pearl' – available from www.carcanet.co.uk

Presented by Georgia de Chamberet | Produced by Ben Fiagbe.

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A BookBlast 10x10 Tour LIVE event from Waterstones Liverpool (01.11.2018) Feat. Roh-Suan Tung, publisher, Balestier Press (chair). Founded in 2014, Balestier Press publishes Asian literature in translation, young-adult fiction, and picture books.

WITH Nicky Harman, a UK-based prize-winning literary translator, working from Chinese to English. Winner of the Mao Tai Cup People’s Literature Chinese-English translation prize 2015, and of the 2013 China International Translation Contest, Chinese-to-English section, with Jia Pingwa’s 'Backflow River'.

AND Georgia de Chamberet stepping in as interviewer, since award-winning young author, Yan Ge, was very ill in bed with flu. Topics: The availability of Asian literature on the UK market; the translator opens windows on to the world; mothers and matriarchs in Chinese families; translating colourful bad language when translating 'The Chilli Bean Paste Clan'; sexism and the #MeToo generation; readings in Chinese and English with audience participation; favourite characters in Chinese literature published by Balestier such as 'The Pidgin Warrior' (a satire of nationalism); 'Miss Sophie's Diary' the earliest feminist book translated in the 1930s; 'The Stolen Bicycle' by a Taiwanese novelist longlisted for the Man Booker International Prize 2018; the translator's life. Title focus: 'The Chilli Bean Paste Clan', the recipient of an English PEN Award – available from www.balestier.com

Presented by Georgia de Chamberet | Produced by Ben Fiagbe.

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