Jane Johnson – author

In her 18 years in this incarnation on earth our Norwegian Forest Cat Finn has been responsible for the violent deaths of hundreds of mice, shrews, voles, rabbits, birds (sorry) and even, memorably, one golden pheasant. She has climbed trees, curtains, bookcases and the legs of designer trousers; destroyed carpets, bedspreads, sofa arms and a chaise longue.

She has bossed us about with the imperious insouciance of a Moroccan sultan, careless for our convenience or comfort. She has woken us at 5am without a scrap of conscience, taken up most of the bed, disappeared for days on end while investigating wild roads. She had us opening and closing doors at a whim, without even a glint of humour at her own contrariness.

She has inspired a dozen fictional characters and been depicted on the jacket of an American novel; she has wiped out entire chapters with one careless (or possibly deliberate) misstep and reassigned the values of two computer keyboards.

She has wrecked some of my favourite clothes, left drifts of self-weaving fur on two different continents, without even visiting one of them. She has seen off a dozen rivals and fallen in love with the man I married, seducing him more thoroughly than I ever could. She has turned up her distinctively long, straight Norman helmet noseguard of a nose and curled her little Hitler moustache at more varieties of food than you could shake a tin-opener at.

She had a purr like a Geiger counter, X-ray vision for seeing through fridge doors, a wild streak, a mind of her own and a bellow like a beagle pack in full flight; a bellow that could stop a pedestrian dead at 20 paces, despite being behind the firmly closed windows of a speeding Saab. She left malicious gifts and correction letters in places never imagined by humankind. I will never pack a suitcase, Hoover a room, make a bed, open a tin, run my hand over silk, smell tuna in brine, open the front door or fall asleep without thinking of her.

Farewell Finn (b. 27/12/93 d. 6/9/11) aka Thorfinna Lodbrok (Thorfinna of the Hairy Trousers), Finncat, Finny, Finnbag, Furbag, Fat Cat, Fintle Beast, Finny Monster. All of which were preferable to your pedigree name of Lizzara Dorcas. Requiescat in pace et amore.

Tuareg band Tinariwen provided a significant inspiration for THE SALT ROAD, not only for their driving, hypnotic desert blues, but also the experiences of their lead singer Ibrahim, who inspired some part of Tuareg freedom fighter and lead male character in the novel, Amastan. (The other inspiration for Amastan was revel leader Mano Dayak, an extraordinary, charismatic, intelligent desert chieftain who led diplomatic talks and when those broke down took up arms on behalf of his people and was tragically killed in a helicopter crash, which may or may not have been an accident…) By following this link to the excellent article in today’s Observer newspaper about the band you can download for free an 8-track live album by Tinariwen and listen to their wonderful music.

Just paste this link into your browser and see how good they are:

www.guardian.co.uk/music/2011/aug/21/tinariwen-tuareg-new-york-city

And here’s a link to a video to listen to them:

tinariwen-tassili-video

http://www.penzance-literary-festival.org.uk.html

It’s the second Penzance Literary Festival and I will be there on Friday 29th July, talking about Morocco: corsairs, Tuaregs and harems, my literary inspirations and the world of books, at 3.30pm at Morrab Library, and I’m really looking forward to meeting readers old and new and sharing some time with them.

Published in The Spectator 8th July 2011:

It should have been such a treat those of us who love a good epic tale: a head-to-head between the Arthurian legend cycle and a great modern myth-in-the-making. On the surface of things, Channel 4’s Camelot should have had the edge over Sky Atlantic’s Game of Thrones: stellar cast, time-honoured story, prime-time terrestrial TV slot.

At first sight they both looked handsome with their gorgeous locations, lovingly detailed costumes and castles, a touch of the other-worldly, eye-catching actors in various states of undress. But oh, what a difference in terms of script and dialogue…

It came as no surprise to me that HBO’s Game of Thrones (Sky Atlantic) should win hands down. As his UK publisher, I’ve been watching George RR Martin’s epic A Song of Ice and Fire cycle (of which A Game of Thrones is the first part) blazing a trail towards classic status for the past 15 years, perfect for the lavish HBO (Rome, Sopranos, True Blood) treatment. But I believe the real difference comes down to the nature of this particular series.

Epics like Camelot, Troy and Alexander all fall down horribly on their tin-ear dialogue and sheer implausibility of the characters. Characters in classical epics are symbolic, larger-than-life beings, more than human. Try to cut them down to size by making them psychologically believable, or worse, ‘relevant’ to a modern audience and you’ll make them sound ridiculous. Add fist-bitingly dreadful dialogue and you’ll have us laughing out loud.

‘Whoever pulls the sword from that stone will unite the land,’ Merlin tells Arthur in Camelot. ‘No waaay,’ replies Arthur, as if someone had just told him to go and do with his homework.

Or the usually excellent James Purefoy channelling Brian Blessed as he blasts into the throne room complaining that he’s ‘bloody starving’: ‘I’m King Lot and I haven’t had any dinner!’

It must have been a relief for both Sean Pertwee (Ector) and Purefoy when their respective characters killed one another off in the first episode.

The characters in Game of Thrones have been crafted by a man raised in the age of film, who has indeed spent much of his career as a screenwriter. As you read George RR Martin’s books, the scenes unspool before you like movies. His characters sound and behave like real people. As a result David Benioff and DB Weiss, the scriptwriters on Game of Thrones, have a far easier time of it (making up for the black marks against Benioff’s name after the dreadful Troy, which even Sean Bean’s sly Odysseus could not save).

In the moral universe of A Song of Ice and Fire the compass points are always equivocal: there’s no clear distinction between ‘good’ or ‘evil’. No godlike heroes or stage villains here. Martin’s characters are fully human in their desires and fears, their greed, ambition and fallibility; their occasional shining moments of decency and heroism, all the grubby, glorious contradictions of life. Tyrion Lannister, his main point-of-view character, is a dwarf with a wicked line in wit and a boundless appetite for wine and whores. But he’s also emotionally intelligent, and a book-lover. Likewise, his brother Jaime, a handsome, arrogant man who has cheerfully committed both regicide and incest, develops over the course of the novels into an altogether more sympathetic and likable chap.

Major characters in this series have long and surprising roads to travel or shocking demises in store (just as in life, being beloved won’t save you, as George swings his author’s scythe!) and that is also one of the delights for newcomers to A Song of Ice and Fire: unlike those grand epics on which we’ve been raised, you just don’t know what will happen next. Game of Thrones is only a taster for the massive epic narrative still to come. If you simply can’t wait for the next series (A Clash of Kings will screen in April 2012), you can read the novel, and then carry on with A Storm of Swords and A Feast for Crows. The long-awaited (6 years!) fifth instalment – A Dance with Dragons – is published on July 12th. As one of a very privileged few to have read it, I can promise you you’re in for another ecstatic, gritty, grimy, transcendently glorious treat.

When I stepped off the train at Penzance after my long journey back from the Ayot Literary Festival (which was so enjoyable) I found myself surrounded by pirates. There were pirates everywhere. Hundreds, no, thousands of them. I gather, eavesdropping in the rough communal huddle that passes for a bus queue here in Cornwall, that there were 8700 of them, to be precise. A world record for the greatest number of pirates gathered in one place at one time. Yay! Penzance! Or should that be Arrrrrr…

I have to say some of the costumes were pretty darn good – lots of Jack Sparrow rip-offs (men itching to try out their girlfriend’s eyeliner for years and finally getting a good excuse), and plenty of salty wenches in off-the-shoulder blouses and hooped earrings (but then, Penzance is the Chav capital of West Cornwall). There were bendy cutlasses aplenty, and fake parrots lurching drunkenly from shoulders. No scimitars though – it seems only Abdel does Barbary corsair (with some aplomb, as you might imagine). Rather a lot were default “pirates” in the sort of “costumes” you might cobble together from what you might find in the back of the wardrobe: stripy T-shirts, cut-off shorts and bandanas, and some attempts were desultory in the extreme. I mean what self-respecting pirate would wear flipflops? Or worse, fit-flops?! Or, chaviest of all, neon Crocs? (shudder) To say these efforts were half-hearted would be generous. Quarter – or maybe eigthth-hearted would be nearer the mark.

But as the bus drew into Newlyn, things took a properly piratical turn. These chaps actually looked as if they lived in their outfits, got blood and fish scales and salt stains on them. Looked as if they got into fights at the Swordfish inn in them. Did dodgy deals for contraband at the Red Lion in them. One dandy was wearing a faded velvet waistcoat and honest-to-god breeches. And battered buckle-shoes. I looked for a sword, but he must have stowed it with his stash. There were pirates hanging over the railing above the harbour in the sunshine necking rum and ale and smoking suspicious-looking roll-ups. And shouldering babies which had clearly been stolen from prams parked outside the Co-op and were now destined to be shipped out to the white-slave markets in North Africa…

I’m home, I thought, grinning. Now, where did I put my eyepatch and pistol?

Despite being an editor I really hate being edited. Shock, denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance: classic Kübler-Ross cycle! One of my authors once said: “When I get your editorial letter I go in the bathroom and scream for 5 minutes; then I get to work.” I screamed for 20… but the revised SULTAN’S WIFE is finally delivered to Penguin for publication Feb 2012. Phew…

How fabulous is this cake? Thank you Emma, Tracey, Dawn, Frances and (cakemaker) Ros at Swindon Central Library for a really great event last night for the Festival of Literature. (The lettering on the lilac ‘book’ is my name in Tifinagh, the Tuareg alphabet: you’ll have to read THE SALT ROAD to understand what I mean by that.)

If you’re in the area do come along for a discussion about Morocco, the Sahara, the Tuareg and adventures of the heart – I’ll be sharing my experiences, taking questions, showing photos and reading a little from The Sultan’s Wife. It should be fun!

7.30pm at the Central Library:

http://www.swindonfestivalofliterature.co.uk/03-tue.html

Today I was cleaning my collection of wood and stones in the bathroom (too rare an occurrence, I’m afraid: housework is not my forte). As I ran each one under the tap I remembered with wonderful clarity where they’d come from; vivid little snapshots of time – down to the colour of the sky, the smell in the air, the company I’d kept, the feelings I had as I pocketed my keepsake.

For each of these stones encapsulates a unique memory for me, and it reminded me that in many legends witches stored their magic, or sometimes their souls, in stones they kept hidden, to keep them safe from rivals. They are perfect magical objects, stones: each has its own character, its own history.

Here is the piece of obsidian – a shard of black volcanic glass (the ‘dragonglass’ of the George RR Martin novels, the only substance that can kill an Other) – I picked up in a storm while exploring the wild mountain interior of Iceland with artist Georg Gudni and my friend Pilar Perez.

Here, striped and polished by the waters of Lake Mavora, is a pebble I stashed away while watching the final scenes of Fellowship of the Ring being filmed; here some twists of smooth grey driftwood from the shores of Lake Te Anau, where I went fishing with Aragorn, Legolas, Merry and Pippin. This piece of tawny granite came from the deserts of Joshua Tree, where I walked with Viggo and Bridgit to see the Native American petroglyphs.

This chunk of glittering quartz I carried off the Lion’s Face mountain in Morocco as a talisman of my survival after Bruce and I got benighted on our climb – it went all the way to London, and then came back again as I shipped the contents of my London flat to Morocco. These two little white snail shells are from the same mountain: amazing they remain intact despite their fragility after their thousands-of-miles round-trip. A piece of rough pink stone studded with flecks of glittering silver came out of a dry riverbed on one of my first walks with Abdel. A heavy iron meteorite picked up out of the sand in the heart of the Sahara when I was researching THE SALT ROAD…

There are seawashed pebbles from beaches in my native Cornwall – from inaccessible places like Kenidjack Cove, where I climbed my favourite route, Saxon – and other climbing mementos from West Wales and Yosemite, Norway and Spain. Tailings and amethyst geodes from abandoned tin mines on Cornwall’s north coast. Fossils and azurite, granite and shale, haematite and crystal.

All my life lies buried in this little trove. But like those legendary witches, only I hold the key to the memories they contain!

It’s going to be a busy summer! (will update as dates come nearer)

May 3rd – Swindon Festival of Literature http://www.swindonfestivalofliterature.co.uk/
May 7-15th – St Ives Literature Festival
June 14th – 24th – Golowan Festival
June 25th – Ayot Literary Festival http://www.ayotliteraryfestival.com/
July – Penzance Literary Festival

Not sure how I’m going to find time to write…