Whatever Happened To….Robert McLiam Wilson?
I continue my sporadic, ill-thought-out series to wonder the whereabouts of the author of Ripley Bogle. Another book I read in my late teens, Ripley Bogle really bowled me over with its sheer exuberant energy. The novel is the first-person narrative of a still young, yet aged-in-the-soul man we find living as a down-and-out in London, a Catholic refugee from the slums of Belfast with genius level IQ. A witty, amoral cynic with a fantastic turn of phrase and a seriously misanthropic attitude to anything and everything.
The "troubles" of Northern Ireland of were of course an inevitable presence in the book, but it is a tribute to Wilson's writing that he both brilliantly encapsulated that and utterly trasnscended it with this work. Alternately black and warm hearted, everything about this book; its powers of description, its masssive scope, its pitch-perfect sureness of tone, was astounding. It mirrored Mike Leigh's film Naked in having a central fallen protagonist traversing a chaotic modern day filth-strewn London full of outsiders, in many ways a thoroughly unlikeable character who wins us over despite ourselves through the wit and insight they bring to their misanthropy. This book came first though, has to be said.
I know its not just the hormone addled memories talking either, I re-read it a lot more recently in my early 20s and it still shone through. In fact, its one of the few novels I?ve re-read in their entirety ever. It really has that magnetic hold.
So what's Wilson up to now? He followed it up with two other novels, Manfred's Pain and Eureka Street, which I must confess I've not read, but I really should. If they've got an ounce of Ripley Bogle's invention I can't go wrong. Meanwhile, Wilson seems to have gone silent since 1996. Oh, except for an interview during 1998 during which he described Manfred's Pain as shit. A great shame. Surely more than ever before, this age cries out for a beautifully expressed nihilist to lay out the dank sight or site as shite before us?
Rumours of a new novel are confirmed on Amazon. The synopsis for The Extremists, to be published by Secker & Warburg in December 2006, reads: “Meet Judas, a feckless thirtysomething whose past is littered with wrecked love affairs, his father an atheist who lurks outside churches telling people it’s made to speak to the invisible man. All his life his mother has told him the maternal instinct is a fiction.”
Also, according to an entry by Ian Sansom (who I would say speaks on good authority) for the British Council site, his cat, ?Catty Wilson, Owner of Irish Author Robert McLiam Wilson?, has its own website: http://www.visi.com/~danda1/
Wilson was the writer in residence at the University of Ulster at Coleraine when I was there in the mid 90′s. He was in charge of a creative writing course, which was part of the English Lit program. I never took the course but remember several friends of mine who did saying he was a compulsive chain smoker, smoking up to 80 Silk Cuts a day!
I also recall seeing a program on the BBC I think which he presented. It was an investigative journalism piece where he examined how much had really changed since the cease fire. I remember thinking he could have a career in broadcasting, he had good screen presence and came across well.
I read Ripley Bogle while studying and found it immensely well written and apparently it was to some extent autobiographical.
Thanks Stephen and Susan.
Stephen – I remember smoking shit-loads of cigarettes featured very heavily in Ripley Bogle’s narrative, good to Wilson had put the research in!
Susan -great news. Roll on twelve months time!
I also remember the programme that Stephen mentioned. Wilson went into a sports shop in Belfast with a camera crew to buy a baseball bat. (There are no baseball teams in Northern Ireland. Paramilitaries used them to dole out punishment beatings.) Wilson left the shopkeeper in no doubt that he was going to use to bat for nefarious purposes. The shopkeeper had no problems in selling it to him.
Also, the BBC made a two-part drama out of Eureka Street that was pretty good.
Adrian.
I’d vaguely heard of the BBC drama Eureka Street, but didn’t see it and had no idea Wilson was involved with it. Until Adrian and Stephen spaketh I’d had no idea he’d been on the telly at all. Thanks all. I’m looking forward to The Extremists, and may dip into another beforehand.
From being stunned as a raw youth reading Ripley Bogle, I’d have to generally agree with Wislon’s feelings for Manfred’s Pin. Not a lot to recommend it, as I remember. Haven’t read Eureka St.
Read Eureka Street. It is his best work to date. If you can get hold of the TV series watch it too … a great dramatisation … tragically not released by the BBC.
I’ve read all of Wilson’s novels. Year’s ago I borrowed Ripley’s Bogle from the local library. I was reading it one night in the bath; and dropped it. I fessed up to the library, and had to pay $4 (Australian) for it. I still have the hardcover copy on my bookshelf and think now what a bonus buy it was. Bring on The Extremists !
Someone I know adapted Ripley Bogle for the stage back in the early 90s. It was a three-hander, with one guy playing Bogle, and two other people playing all the other parts. It had a run as a student show in Oxford and then a few years later in a pub theatre in London.
I agree that Eureka St. is his best so far. Looking for recent news about him I found this song, which appears to be “loosely based” on Eureka St.:
http://tepeyacusto.bandcamp.com/track/belfast
I haven’t read Ripley Bogle, but have read Eureka Street and I frequently list it as one of my favorite books ever. If Ripley Bogle is anything like Eureka Street, I’m checking it out tomorrow. I was so smitten with the writing in this book I underlined all through my book (which I NEVER do) – almost all of chapter 10! I also got the Barnes and Noble at which I worked to feature it as an “Employee Recommendation”, and had my book club read it. To date Eureka Street is one of the book club’s favorite reads, and we have been meeting every 6 weeks for over 12 years. My (then) husband picked it up in an English airport display as one of the nominees for the Booker that year…the same year “God of Small Things” won. The Eureka Street mini series was quite good too. Followed the book nicely. Read it! Watch it!
All Wilson’s books are very good. I wish to find more, but Im not sure he wrote any more…It is interesting fact he moved recently to Paris with his wife. I am working in Belfast and hope to see him here but …
Anywhere he is my favorite writer and I like to read Eureka Street again and again….and enjoy every page of book. Superrrr!
Jolanta
I am happy so share an interview I made and edited with the author.
http://lamensuelle.over-blog.fr/article-robert-mcliam-wilson-en-interview-au-book-in-bar-46447146.html
Its in french and he talks about his forthcoming book Extremists.
People can contact me here for further details : sthuret@yahoo.fr
Sylvain Thuret
http://lamensuelle.over-blog.fr/
http://www.leonardcohensite.com/facts/
I live in the Pacific Northwest in the US but am going to Belfast in a couple of weeks and stumbled upon Eureka Street and am very taken by it–I think it is an excellent novel, and an interesting insight into Belfast and Northern Ireland.
I agree with Eileen (above) who noted that Chapter Ten was truly outstanding. Beautifully written!
I enjoyed reading Ripley Bogle too. I recently read Knut Hamsun’s late 19th century novel Hunger and was struck by the close comparisons between the two books, particularly in the descriptions of cold and hunger.