Bookshelfie: Women’s Prize Podcast - S7 Ep8: Bookshelfie: Ann Akinjirin

Episode Date: April 30, 2024

Ann Akinjirin is an actress, writer, director and producer working across screen and stage and is currently starring in the BBC’s new adaptation of Enid Blyton’s The Famous Five.  Ann is best known for her recurring roles in BBC 1 /HBO’s The Strike Series playing ‘DS Vanessa Ekwensi’ and ‘Dee’ in BBC Two’s Trigonometry. More recently, Ann played 'Bobbi' in Marvel Studios series Moon Knight on Disney+.  Ann set up her own theatre company Harts in 2010, of which she was Artistic Director until 2020. Ann is extremely passionate about creative accessibility within theatre and has worked as movement director for Deafinitely Theatre as well as with National Youth Theatre as a writer and director, creating shows for audiences inclusive of deaf and visually impaired members.  Ann’s book choices are: ** Secrets by Francine Pascal ** All About Love by bell hooks ** A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara ** Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner ** Cleopatra and Frankenstein by Coco Mellors Vick Hope, multi-award winning TV and BBC Radio 1 presenter, author and journalist, is the host of season seven of the Women’s Prize for Fiction Podcast. Every week, Vick will be joined by another inspirational woman to discuss the work of incredible female authors. The Women’s Prize is one of the most prestigious literary awards in the world, and they continue to champion the very best books written by women. Don’t want to miss the rest of season seven? Listen and subscribe now! This podcast is sponsored by Baileys and produced by Bird Lime Media.

I really love that I wasn't restricted to an author's idea, a writer's idea, a producer's idea, an audience's idea of who Fannie's should be. The creative team have been really lovely with just letting me do what I want to do. And I think it's not a direct adaptation of the books. It's a retelling of the books. So that also gives us a freedom to bring the books into modern day. There are so much of the books that need to be brought into modern day. and I think it allows us to give new eyes and a new take on who these characters are. With thanks to Bayleys, this is the Women's Prize for Fiction Podcast, celebrating women's writing, sharing our creativity, our voices and our perspectives, all while championing the very best fiction written by women around the world.

I'm Vic Hope and I am your host for Season 7 of Bookshelfy. The podcast that asks women with lives as inspiring as any fiction to share the five books by women that have shaped them. Join me and my incredible guests. As we talk about the books, you'll be added to. I am joined by Anne. Anne is an actress, writer, director and producer working across stage and screen. Anne is best known for her recurring roles in BBC 1 in HBO's The Strike series, playing DS Vanessa at Quincy, and D in BBC 2's Trigonometry.

More recently, Anne played Bobby. in Marvel Studios series Moon Night on Disney Plus. And set up her own theatre company, Hearts, in 2010, of which she was artistic director until 2020. Anne is extremely passionate about creative accessibility within theatre, and has worked as movement director for Definitely Theatre, as well as with the National Youth Theatre, as a writer and director, creating shows for audiences inclusive of deaf and visually impaired members.

Anne is currently starring in the BBC's new adaptation of Enidavis. Blightens the famous vibe. Welcome to the podcast band. That was quite an intro. How like cringy it was, but if I, but all true. You know what? Whenever you do these intros, I do think it must be really weird like just to sit through your accolades, like sit through your achievements. I was like looking at the floor. You did that. You did that. Yeah, I did. How does it feel when you do hear it all listed like that? Because presumably, you know, this is something you work towards. you had ambitions towards. And we don't always take stock of our achievements

because we're always looking to the next thing. Yeah. And I think as entertainers, I don't know if it's different for when you're presenting or, but I think especially for actors, we have this thing where we shrink ourselves a bit where you don't want to go, oh, I've done, oh, I'm doing blah, blah, blah.

So I'm so used to going, oh, yeah, I'm just naturally just doing a few bits. So to hear it all, it kind of makes me go, you know. How many people and particularly women, I hear when they're asked, what do you do? I hear them undersell it. Yeah.

Put themselves down just that little bit underplay. How great they are. I'm so used to that. But also I think it's, I think most performers maybe are a bit, a bit more introverted than they, people have presumed them to be. So it's a kind of job that people want to go, oh, right, okay. And I also just don't want to have the conversation. So there is, there is an element of shrinking.

And then there's also an element of just being like, I actually wish I could just say, oh, I'm an accountant, and that's the end of the end. And then we can move on. Yeah, so it's a combination of that of shrinkage. And there's also not wanting to have all the attention on myself. It's funny because we do actually define ourselves with our jobs. If someone asks, what do you do?

I mean, the answer could be, well, I wake up in the morning. I like to have a cup of tea. These are all things that I do. Absolutely. Whenever anyone asks me, if I don't want to get into the conversation because I'm a bit embarrassed of the connotations. I always go, oh, I work with young people because everyone in my office is pretty young.

Yeah, I'm like, I might steal that. Let's talk about the world of books. And I assume, you know, when you're writing, you're producing, you're directing, you're surrounded by writing. Yeah. You're surrounded by words and stories. But how much of that is reading a nice book?

Reading a nice book for me is reading. really important. I think we all have different ways to these words, but the buzz words the self-care words I'm going to use, but just kind of to bring ourselves back to ourselves or to feel relaxed and reading is a massive part of that and has always been for me. When I was much younger, I always loved to go into libraries on my own and I would sit on the floor in the aisles of libraries by myself. So it is irrespective of the job that I landed into. It's always being a big part of what makes me feel like myself.

It's interesting that you mentioned just before, you know, actors often are more introverted than maybe you'd expect. And that image that you've just described of a little girl, like sitting alone on the floor of a library, there's nothing sad about it in the slightest to me because I relate, strong, relate. But it plays into that. Yeah. And I guess I, because I am quite a sociable person, but I'm highly sensitive in that I can, I can sense everything.

So sometimes it is, one, being introverted, but also I need the quiet. And libraries are so quiet. And also reading is such a solitary, silent, you very rarely read out loud. It's such a solitary silent thing to do that that's what I love about it as well is being on my own and being silent. And I guess in that respect is so different from your job where you, you are reading out loud. Yeah, yeah, exactly. And as you've grown, as you've become an adult,

how do you make the time to have that quiet and to make sure that you're reading those stories that you love? I mean, I think in some ways I'm lucky enough that I have periods when I'm working a lot and then I have periods that are quiet comfortably. So I'm always got a book. I actually always have a book on me anyway. And sometimes depending on like where I'm at with work and stuff,

I have this morning routine that I come back to. So I never ever charged my phone in my room. And before I grab my phone in the morning, I like to write in my journal, read a chapter of a book, and do all these other things and then catch the phone. So I kind of interweave it into like just part of what I do in the day. And I'm not saying I'd be insincere to say, I do that every single day really strictly.

I don't. But reading is just like I said, that always have a book, there's always a book in the bag, there's always two books on the bedside table. It just is the thing that I pick up and do. Well, let's find out about some of those books that are intertwined, have been intertwined with your life that have shaped you. Your first book, Shelfy Book, is Secrets by Francie Pascal.

Beautiful and ruthless. Jessica Wakefield is determined to be chosen, Queen of the Fall Dance at Sweet Valley High. If she can win the contest, she is sure to win Bruce Patman, the most sought after boy in school. The only person standing in Jessica away is Enid Rollins. Only Elizabeth can save Enid from Jessica's vicious gossip,

but can she stop her scheming twin in time? So I love the enthusiasm, fizzing from you about this. This is, of course, from the Sweet Valley High series. Yeah. What did you love about that series so much as a kid? It was my introduction to being a bookworm. And I didn't realize it at the time. I didn't realize not everyone reads books all the time.

And Sweet Valley High was on TV when at that time. That's when I was in my first year of secondary school, I think, was when the show was really huge. So it kind of wasn't enough for me to just watch it on screen. I needed to, and there were so many books, so I needed to be able to know what was happening or like there was this attachment to the characters on the page. And I think what I loved as well about those books is

it was the beginning of me imagining what it would be like. not just seeing how they translate it on screen. I could imagine what it was like, what the school looked like, or what they were wearing or how their voices sound. And I genuinely used to stay up at night. My mum would kind of turn the lights out, and I would turn the light back on and read until I fell asleep. And that was the beginning of, I can say it in reflection.

And in hindsight, that was beginning of me becoming attached to storytelling and words in that way. I have such fun memories, though, of just making sure I went to the library. and that was part of my journeys to the library so I could get the upper the new books in the series so you've got such a wide grin I just love reading about that

yeah and thinking back to it and it's like this introduction to world building yeah it's like that world continued beyond the show's only on say for half an hour once a week but that world still continues those lives those characters are still going about falling in love

for getting their homework and you can just carry that on it's so exciting to know that in the pages of a book, you could continue building that world. And you can take your time with it as well, because with TV then, it wasn't, you couldn't pause and and record, you couldn't do that. You had to sit and watch it for that half an hour. And if you were distracted by something, you lose it. Whereas with a book, you can pause and you can, you can go back to it and you can lengthen it out, you know? And I think that's really special about books. I know this is a series, but what made you pick this one? Was that a tough decision? well i really love the provocation of books that um like meant something to me and it's my earliest

memory of feeling really attached to books is this were the sweet valley high series of books and i immediately thought well if i was to think about myself as an avid book reader it started then yeah and i know you you got into acting at quite a young age how does that fit with this timeline this sort of being around 11 falling in love with world making in this way and reading like this for pleasure. So what's so interesting is that I, it's around about the same time. Yeah. But I always saw them as two separate things.

Really? I never attached, and I guess even now, even though I feel like when I'm reading a script, I feel like I have a different relationship to those words in that paper to when I'm reading a novel. It's just, it feels like a separate thing, oddly. So maybe I didn't realize it was so intertwining. and actually the actor, a performer that was building and me was also reaching out for words and stories in books because they all were connected. I never saw them that way at all.

I saw it as, this was my hobby. I love acting and I do that thing. But this is the thing that I find solitary and I love going to the library on my own and it calms me. They were so separate. And can you remember what it felt like? What was it like to set out in the world of acting at such a young age? Why did you want to? it was something I always did so the summer holidays there was so much to do when I was a kid in the summer

there were community centres and youth groups and summer holiday camps and stuff so my mum just always happened to send me and my brothers to the performing arts ones and and it just also used to be a thing that me and my brothers and I would do to waste time we would make up dances or my older brother especially was really musically talented so he would teach us the the different parts to songs and the harmonies and whatever. So it wasn't until I realised it was something that people could do, that I realised it was something I wanted to do. I just thought it was what kids did, you know?

And then I got to school and audition for a play. And then, you know, I've told this story so many times. And then a friend asked me to go to Sylvia Young with her. And I suddenly was like, oh, this is what people can do. You can, yeah. Oh, okay. It's a job in everything. But then I was like, but I've always been doing it.

So great. Yeah. Let me just really, really focus on it. from 11. You know what? You've talked about youth centres, community centres, libraries, all these places. I loved just like you, the libraries so much.

I loved community centres. There were so many opportunities. How do you feel when you look at the current situation for young people when it comes to the arts and just community in general? Yeah, it's really sad actually. Because I was even thinking about I was talking to someone a few days ago about how when you were younger, there wasn't this fear to just go out and explore.

Like your parents could kind of go, all right, see you at the end of the day. And you and you and yourself or you and your little brothers would just go out. And there was the space and the safety societally to explore as young people. And I just don't think we have that now. For good reasons and bad reasons. Like there's no chance I would send off one of my nephews is seven. I would never just send him off out onto the street to hang out with the kids all day. I just wouldn't do it, you know.

But they're also, like you said, there isn't a. okay well you can't hang out on the streets but you can go to the club at the bottom of the we just don't have that and we were inundated with that when I was a kid it is sad I'm just hoping that that solace that we found can still be found in all these books like the books that you're describing the kids books that you're describing and that made you smile so broadly I love to see it your second book shelphy book is all about love by bell hooks bell hooks scholar cultural critic and feminist skewers our view of love as romance.

In its place, she offers a proactive new ethic for a people and a society bereft with lovelessness. As she explores the question, what is love? Her answers strike at both the mind and the heart. Raising the cultural paradigm that the ideal love is infused with sex and desire, she provides a new path to love that is sacred, redemptive, and healing for the individuals and for a nation. I mean, what is it?

about this book that spoke to you particularly? Interestingly, so I knew of Bell Hook's, but I hadn't read any of her books before. This was the first Bell Hook's book that I read, and it was only a few years ago. And it was given to me. I feel like I said it fell from Heaven's, like, manor onto my hands. I was post-breakup, but I was like,

you know the raw, raw point of breakup? We all know it. And then it was, so it was pandemic, but it's 21. And I'm forever asked to write for people's weddings. And a childhood friend of mine had asked me to write for her wedding. But the 2020 version was cancelled. So it was coming back. And between 2020 and 21, I'd gone through this breakup.

And I was like, my speech isn't good enough. It's hard to write about love. Well, you can write about it if it's a very different picture. Yeah, I was like, it's not good enough. I was like, I need to go in and deeper. So I was actually on a job. And I picked up if Bill Street could talk that book. Because I love that book.

And I love Baldwin and how he's written about the relationship and that. So I was on set reading this book and the set designer, costume designer, sorry, started talking to me. And I was telling a story. I was like, I need to write this thing. And I just want to write about love and like dig deep. And so I'm reading this. I can get back into it. And she was like, you should read all about love.

What you're saying to me reminds me of the first paragraph and all about love. And I genuinely thought it was just going to be about love and love stories and whatever. And when she gave it to me, I was like, sucker punched me. It's soccer punched me. It was exactly not just for to write this speech for the wedding, but like to bring me, kind of pull me up a little bit because I was in the deep depths of pain

and to reassess what I thought, really, and to really look at myself and be gentle with myself and understand and look back on things that I thought or things that have happened and understand how that has influenced love for me. It just, it changed me. It fully just gave me some strength as well. And I wrote an amazing speech, actually, to be, you know, really humble. It really, yeah, it was just, but I didn't, it wasn't on my radar.

It came from reading a different book on set and then it being gifted to me and I read it in days. She challenges the notion of romantic love being the purest form. You mentioned it, make you reassess how you thought about love. about yourself, it gave you strength, which is what love does, what it should do. But also it gave me like, there sometimes I found it hard to find the language to describe certain things. And I love the way that she deconstructs this simplicity that we have towards love and what it means and what the word is. And I loved that. And also this challenge of we all define love love so differently. And that's a hard thing about loving is because I can say, I love you to you,

and you're saying it back. And I think you mean it the same way that I'm. I mean it and you don't. And then that in and of itself is conflict. If we're starting from the same place, then at least we're kind of journeying together. And so often in life, we're all just have so many different definitions to what love is, which is what makes sometimes can make it so difficult to love.

I remember reading Alice Walker's the colour purple and changing what I felt love was and also what I felt God was. and it brought me a strength and a sureness, a certainty in the love that I had inside of me that I all of a sudden realised I didn't need it from anyone else. And then that's when I fell in love. There you go. It's always the way. It's always the way.

Actually, I'm fine now. Yeah. Totally. But the whole energy around me shifted. And it was thanks to that, those words that I couldn't have thought of until I'd read them. Couldn't have done. I mean, as an actor, you must think and talk about. love a lot every TV show play film that there are stories whether it is about love or

whether there are stories of love intertwined relationships romances they're always there what's your relationship to love in in those contexts that's such a good question actually because I don't think I acknowledge it in that context maybe I will move forward unless it's really obvious like in the famous five I play the mother and George and and Fannie have such a strong relationship and the love is very important there. So I will think about it very specifically because it influences how I take on the role. But then like in a role like Moon Night where it's just all about, you know, goodies and baddies and powers and no powers and, you know,

I'm not particularly thinking about love there. But you're right, it is all important. It's all encompassing. So that's something I will take forward. Why do you think that love so frequently feet? is portrayed in the art we consume. It's an age-old part of everything, of all the books that we read, of all the films you are.

Because it's so unifying. It's a uniting thing. Irrespective of who you are, what your economic background is, your social status is, your gender, whatever it is, we all experience love. We all know it. We all know the word.

It may be complicated. We may have different definitions of it, but it's one thing that none of us can say we don't know. And that's why it's just the best, to put in things because we're always going to find something to connect to. I can feel viscerally the power that Bell Hook's All About Love had over you and in you. It helped you reassess a part of your life, he said. Do you look for that quality in the books you read?

Are you always hoping for something so transformative? Not necessarily. I guess sometimes because I always, right now I'm not, but I always read two books at the same time. So I'm always reading a novel and some sort of, whether it's a memoir or a, I don't want to call them self-helpie, but a non-fiction. So I guess I'm always looking for something that will teach me something and something that will allow me to escape.

And they can all, they can all come in different forms. I always listen to myself as well. Sometimes I'll pick up a book and it's just not what my body wants on my mind or my spirit wants. And it might be at another time, just not then. I'm like, no, this is the book for me. So I can't really say what specifically I look for. I just need to find a connection to the words that I'm reading. and then it goes from there.

Baileys is proudly supporting the Women's Prize for Fiction by helping showcase incredible writing by remarkable women, celebrating their accomplishments and getting more of their books into the hands of more people. Baileys is the perfect adult treat, whether shaken in a cocktail, over ice cream, or paired with your favourite book. Check out baileys.com for our favourite bailey's recipes.

The third book that you've picked today is one that I do know has a very visceral effect as well on every single person I know who has picked it up and it's a little life by Hanya Yanigahara when four graduates from a small Massachusetts college Willem, J.B., Malcolm and Jude moved to New York to make their way. They're broke, adrift and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition.

Over the decades, their relationships deepen and darken tinged by addiction, success and pride. Yet their greatest, challenge is Jude himself. By midlife he is an increasingly broken man, his mind and body scarred by an unspeakable childhood and haunted by a trauma he fears will define his life forever. I remember reading this on a trip to Nigeria when I went back to see my grandma, my family, and on the plane back, I was not just crying, I was wailing. I was like audibly wailing. And the man next to me went, I'm sorry.

sure it is a lovely story but can you please be quiet? See I got up and went to the toilet and had a bit of a on the plane. So it was about six years ago so many of these books are like breakup books but it was about 2016 I went on a solo trip around Indonesia and I took that book with me. What's interesting is I tried to read it again a year or so ago and I was like oh Not sure I'm not sure I can go through it again

But I've read everything she's written I think she is an incredible writer Hanegahara And I think there was something about Being pained and reading pain at the same time That was really I can now say was really important for me It's like it gave me a way to release

Something that I needed to release You know this story was sad And it was tragic and I could cry for and not act like I was trying to crying for myself. And I also, I think I loved the detail. Like every single, there were no characters that aren't fleshed out. Every single character is so fleshed out in this book. And I felt like I had friends with me on this really long trip.

But yeah, I did, oh my God, that final chapter. Oh man. Yeah, it kicked, it kicked me in. my gut. Yeah, and I just cannot read it again. Yeah. It's been labelled as trauma porn and sort of had a bit of resurgence not that long ago, especially on book talk.

And I think as well, we should talk about the stage adaptation. You just talked about how the characters are so fleshed out in the novel. I don't know. Have you seen the station? No, I don't know. I don't know if I can. Yeah. So that's at the Savoy Theatre starring James Norton and Amari Douglas.

you said something earlier about when you're reading a book versus when you're watching something, you get to take the time away from it. And what I would say about this stage adaptation is you can't look away. So when all of that trauma porn in inverted comments is happening, you've got to just sit through it. And people were fainting. There was one woman behind me who they thought had died at one point, but she was absolutely fine. And she just threw up. But it's all happening.

There's so much blood. You can't look away. process what you need to process and it sounds like this was a really important book of processing for you is there a danger when we adapt a book that is so fleshed out there's so nuanced where the characters are so full that you lose something really important yeah i just i understand why people were having those reactions in the crowd because i needed to i loved them but i needed to put it down for just a second. Yeah.

Okay. And take a minute, you know, to, to, so when you, when you are attached to people or you have some sort of emotional connection to people, you want to be able to be gentle. And you don't want to see all of that happen to them relentlessly. So I think there is, it's interesting, I haven't seen it. So I can't, I can't talk too strongly about the danger of adapting it onto stage. but I can understand how it would be really difficult and I can understand how it's probably people prefer to read the book

because I don't, I just can't. And of course, conversely, what a brilliant thing. If there's a great book and I'm sure in your position, you have read so many good books and thought, you know what, let's make it, let's do this. I mean, should more books be adapted into plays maybe rather than TV shows and films or vice versa? That's tough, it's tough, it's tough.

It's a tough one, actually. because I a lot of the time prefer the books of the adaptation. Right. But I've loved so many adaptations, but if I've watched something that I haven't read first, I always go back to read it because I want to experience the novel. I think with, it's a beauty of time. Novels, there's so much time with them.

And when you adapt something from book to stage all screen, you have to cut. You have to go, oh, we can't take so much time with that moment because we need to move on or we've only got two hours to show this story within. whereas I, for example, picked up and dropped off a little life over six weeks, right? We're not going to watch a play for six weeks.

I mean, Netflix would try. Yeah. We're not watching a play for six weeks, you know? Or even like I remember, I remember I watched Atonement before I read the book. Yeah. And there was so much in the book that I was like, oh, I'm so glad I read the book

because I needed those moments and I didn't get them on screen. And I loved the film, but I didn't get those things on screen. So there is, there is a beauty and a power to translate in things to stage or screen, but you're always going to miss things and you're always going to have to lose things. Well, speaking of adaptations, you are currently starring in BBC's The Famous Five.

You are making this really well-known character, Aunt Fanny, your own. Yeah. How do you find that? I find it great. I really love that I wasn't restricted to an author's idea, a writer's idea, a producer's idea, an audience's idea of who Fanny should be. The creative team have been really lovely with just letting me do what I want to do. And I think it's not a direct adaptation of the books.

It's a retelling of the book. So that also gives us a freedom to bring the books into modern day. There are so much of the books that need to be brought into modern day. And I think it allows us to give new eyes and a new take on who these characters are. while staying true to it because there is, you know, there is the original stories

and the original characters and you need to stay true to that within reason. But I think it's great that we've got the freedom and we don't have the parameters to play in. I read that you didn't actually read Enid Blytheon as a child. So what was it about getting involved in this adaptation that really intrigued you? I think it was a number of things. Some jobs we have loads of time to think about it or you're going for a really long audition process.

And some, you come and you've got to start straight away. Let's go. Yeah, they're like, you got the job, you've got until Tuesday. But it started with the text, to be honest. I read the script and I was like, oh, oh, oh, okay, this is fun. And also, I was sent a breakdown of who Fanny was or how they saw Fanny and what they're going to do with her. And I was very on board with that.

I loved how detailed they were about her Nigerian heritage. So Fanny is short for Fain Tola. which is my mum's name actually yeah and I was like that's good this is good you haven't just gone Fanny Fanny could be short for

whatever generic African name I was like that is a very specific Nigerian name and it's also a European name which I am and I was really into that and I also love that Fanny's smart and she's they met in uni but she was the smarter one

and she's the one that's the breadwinner and I thought yeah I can get on board of that I can get all of that so yeah it was that it was the text it was the team I didn't obviously meet a lot of them until we got on to the show and started filming together but I have the

the joy of working with such a brilliant cast we really do love each other so that wasn't after after getting the job but it definitely started with the text I read the script and I was on board reading a lot of of Enid Blighton now you touch on it just before

the work has been labelled as racist or xenophobic what do you think of classics being re-edited or updated or should we just separate the problems from the work? I don't think we should separate the problems from the work. I think the beautiful thing about history is history cannot be rewritten, but what it can do by having readaptations or retellings of stories, it means it starts a conversation. I think the conversation is important. I don't think we need to erase that Enid had racist or xenophobic themes in her writing. What we do is we do is we

talk about it now in present day and we have those conversations because a lot of the time the issue is we don't have the conversations and I think that is what causes a lot of misunderstanding a lot of conflict is let's just I think it's so important not to go let's just brush down to the carpet and look it's new we've got a black mom and a mixed race kid no no no what we do is by retelling it and recasting it in that way these conversations or these questions are going to come up and now let's have that conversation we talk a lot on this podcast actually about on the subject of rewriting history of the new perspectives

of the perspectives that were maybe undermined or erased often history is from a white male perspective where's everyone else? And it's about finding those perspectives and giving voice to those whose voices have been taken away. Absolutely. Your fourth book today and is Crying in H-Mart by Michelle Zorner

with humour and heart Michelle Zorner tells of growing up the only Asian-American kids at her school in YouTube. Oregon, of struggling with her mother's particular high expectations of her, of a painful adolescence of treasured months spent in her grandmother's tiny apartment in Seoul, where she and her mother would bond late at night over heaping plates of food, vivacious and plain spoken, lyrical and honest Michelle Zornner's voice is as radiantly alive on the page as it is on stage. Rich with intimate anecdotes, which will resonate widely, crying in H-Mart is a book to cherish, share

and reread. Now I know you were profoundly affected by this book. Tell me about why it was so impactful. I think to talk honestly, I had this really panicked year where I suddenly felt really aware of ageing and that the fact that I was ageing means my parents are ageing. And I think what's so crazy about aging is that when our parents age or those of us that are able to see our parents into older age, it's like a shock to your system. Suddenly you're like, wait, what? It happens to all of us. And I just got profoundly, like, panicked about my parents are aging and I haven't prepared myself.

So I had this year where I started to read memoirs about grief and crying in H-Mart really made me stand still, really. and what's what I think is so affecting about that book is that the real important part of her relationship with her mother is food and that is a massive part of my relationship with my mother and my mother is an immigrant a migrant and she's Nigerian so there's a Nigerian there's a Nigerian food element to my mum and I there is an ingredient element to our relationship that is so relatable to how she writes about the relationship with her mum

and it really did make me stand back and think about that relationship. I think sometimes, especially historical relationships, like our familial relationships, you can take for granted sometimes as a given. Some of them, some of us have to work on particular relationships, but when you have a close relationship that has developed or has always got ease, you forget about the work that it takes. And yeah, I think I was trying to work through how I feel about my parents' ageing. and I notice it more with my mum because it's more noticeable in my mum than it is in my dad. And this book really helped me with that.

What sort of effect did it have on your relationship with your mum or how you felt about your relationship with your mum? I think what it did is it made me slow down a little bit. I have a lot of patience. I've done way more patience with my mum now than I did as a teenager. But it made me completely slowed down. I remember calling a friend of mine and she was having difficulty with how she felt about her mum and I said, you know what, to be honest,

within reason, I think you should kind of let her do whatever she wants. That's my tuppence. Let her do whatever she wants because it's finite, man. And when that time is done, you are going to be like, she could have just had the bloody blah. She could have just, you know, my mum can do whatever she wants. Because also what I do is a cyclical thing of recognising how, especially with my relationship with my mom

my mom made sure I had whatever I wanted whatever I believed whatever I wanted to achieve my mum was there and my mum only had 10 pound and I needed 9 she'd just give me the 10 she's that kind of mother

and listen this is not to say sometimes I'm like but also I just underestimate the power of my mum and I just I think she just deserves a level of respect that I need to remember she needs or sometimes I'll ask my mum something

or I'll speak to her about something and she just knows she knows the answer and for the most part my mum was a a homemaker so my mum will know more than my dad knows and my mum's one to talk to about the mechanic or the that's my mum you know and it's so interesting when I've said this before when I was younger I thought my mum knew nothing

but now I'm older I realise she knows everything and it's so it's so apparent to me every single day when I speak to my mum and this book really it was the beginning of me changing course. And even though it seems like a subtle thing, it's huge in me, you know. It's a very special book, I'd say. I think there's a realisation that comes as well as we approach the age that our mother was

when we were having those arguments with her about things that we thought she knew nothing about. And I'm like, oh no. If she knows what I know now, she knew. She knew. She absolutely knew. And all I care about at this point in my life is showing them. great time. This is it. I'm like live, just live. This is it. You've done so much. You have worked so hard. You did everything. Absolutely. Now you should just be having the best time of your life.

What do you want. What do you need? Sure. Yes. Let me do it. Yeah. Absolutely. But yeah, I also think it's also important to think about the joy that comes with being a, with being a child. Yeah, someone's child. And I'm remembering that like now, because societyally, we're all about self-care and doing the work and blah, blah, blah. And we've got to remember. the generations before us didn't have that, you know, that time or that space to really become like fully fleshed out, grounded people to parent people, you know? So I also have that grace to my mum for her. Yeah. You said that she has always supported any endeavour of yours.

So I do want to talk very briefly about your theatre company, Hearts that you launched in 2010. You were an advocate for increased access for deaf and visually impaired audiences. What's your driving force? before that it was actually it was an economical thing it was I needed I needed to make sure that whether you had money or you didn't have money you could access great opportunities and great training and then that expanded into disability or different ability access but I just think so often there are so many talented people out there that just didn't have the money or didn't have the opportunity didn't live in London yeah didn't realize they you know I really sometimes

I'm like, wow, we do have everything in London, you know. Yeah. Oh, we have everything. I was thinking the few of the day, because I didn't actually know a huge amount about Brit school, which you attended. And finding out that it was free, I was like, oh my gosh. Well, that's right, because a lot of them are not, and that is not the association with those stage schools.

But if you're not from London, that's not easy. It's not easy. And, you know, I, at the moment, I'm at the London College of Fashion. I'm obsessed with sewing and I do part-time course. And so many of the people, I'm doing a pattern cutting course at the moment. And some of them are from like, you cry. train and someone's come over from Mexico. All these people, someone's from Toronto.

And I'm like, do you not, are you not able to get this in Toronto or Mexico? And they're like, no. No. No. I had to fly over to London and stay here for a month. And I think so that in essence was really about, as I know, a lot of the times, it's about gays, right? And you can think, oh, that's so out of my reach or I'm nothing like them.

And then you get into the opportunity and realize, oh. Oh, okay, we're all just the same. Okay, great. But you have to be in it to know that. access. And so for me with Hearts, when I started that, that was at the episode. And that's why it's called Hearts. It's about the art in the heart, right, of what we love to do.

And I knew I was very well connected. So I knew that I could like provide really fun, great things for kids. Because the kids were like from five all the way up. And so I had a great relationship with them where it would literally be like from to term, what do you want to do? And they could say anything. And I'd be like, okay, I think I know someone who knows someone who can, he can sort that out for you. So let's do that. And we just did amazing, amazing things.

And then I started to think about, well, what else is important to me? I'm so out of practice now, but I used to learn sign language. Sign language was just another thing that I did. And I think visually, sign language is a beautiful language. And it looks like dance. So that's kind of how I started the journey into trying to expand the creative offer. And that journey continues. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Your fifth and final book, Shelby book, today. is Cleopatra and Frankenstein by Cocoa's. Great reaction. New York is slipping from Cleo's grasp. Her student visa is running out and she doesn't even have money for cigarettes. But then she meets Frank. 20 years older, Frank's life is full of all the success and excess that Cleo's lacks.

Cleo and Frank run headfirst into a romance that neither of them can quite keep up with. It reshapes their lives and the lives of those around them. Cleopatra and Frankenstein is an astounding and painfully relatable debut novel about the spontaneous decisions that shape our entire lives and those imperfect relationships born of unexpectedly perfect evenings. You've said that you still think about these characters a year later. Tell me why.

Why did this affect you so much? I just think, I think Cocoa Mellas is an exceptional writer and she wrote these characters that are just so in your friendship group. Cleo especially. Or Cleo is either me when I was, was 20 or I've got a mate that was Clio and I think the way that the relationship is written because too often I think our understanding of love or our toxic attachment to love is because

of what is shown on screen and you think oh yeah it's okay to be with this narcissist guy because Sarah Jessica Parker in blah blah blah for 20 years so okay you know big was so special and he wasn't you know and and this book is written in such a way the love is so strong but it's wrong and it's messy and it's fun and I don't know if it's because I read it as an older person I also could look on it and see how they didn't work but I was so sad that they didn't and then I was happy that she did you know

I just was so attached to these characters and it's so funny as well but yeah I was on this solo holiday and I just I read the book too quickly as well which was really upsetting oh and then you're like I just want it back yeah I just exactly I missed them.

I missed the book. I missed it. So then, and I only, because it's a thick, it's a thick enough book and I was only, I was away for two weeks. So that's surprising. This was a birthday trip as well, was it? Yeah.

Yeah, yeah. I always go away for my birthday. And even though it wasn't a big birthday, it's close to a big birthday, I just was like, I'm really going to spoil myself. I'm really going to just go all out with this holiday. And I took that book,

but it finished so quickly. So then I had to go and get like a novella, which was also great, but it's written by man. But I... Not here. Not today, Satan. Yeah, I just really...

It felt so contemporary. I know those characters. I know... I also know the mess of that love. Like, I've been in a messy love like that. And sometimes when you're in it or on reflection, you feel so humiliated and you feel silly. But there was something quite beautiful

about reading it and seeing why. Because there's always a reason why. It's not as simple as like, well, why do you know, you stay you could have it's not as simple as that it's not just because i'm a fool and you think that in the throws of the breakup but actually seeing it validated on the pages of a book you like you say you see why and you don't feel so silly you don't and i just felt i i was so attached i was so invested to to all of them and i really like the way that it's written actually she's written the

written the chapters in such a great way i just think she's a exceptional debut novel get a bad rep. Why do you think that they are so important and no less deserving than any other genre? Because we're all looking for love and we all can't figure it out and we all sometimes were embarrassed by it and we're all just like want to want to feel reassured, you know, or understand or learn and sometimes you learn from watching or reading. But also this is kind of, I think there's this a kind of an idea of a romance novel and you think of like 80s books written by, you know, and it's all just about smoking and

and making love, whereas this is like, you know, this is every day and they're trying to figure stuff out and she's trying to figure out how to be an artist and he's got this sister. It's just, it's just incredible.

It's an incredible book, man. When you talk about the books that you love, something that I have really enjoyed witnessing is not only the lessons that you've taken away from them, but it's the time you've taken for yourself, which you actually, you said right from the very beginning of this chat, that is so important to you. But it's hearing about these solo trips,

these times, and I'm such a huge advocate for taking yourself away and knowing that your own company is enough. There's such self-care in that. Absolutely. And I started doing it before it became this buzz thing. I started going on solo holidays like 15 years ago where people would be like,

you're doing what? And I just, at first there was discomfort in it. But I understood I really needed to be alone. I needed to be alone out of my environment and I needed time to think. And obviously you can think anywhere, but at first, when I first started going on solo holidays,

I was like, I need to be a way to think. So whenever I drive, I never drive a music on because it's a really good space for me to just think, to be with my thoughts. But in some ways, like, it started off like that.

And then also, I just loved the adventure on my own. I love not having to. Now, obviously, I have amazing holidays and things that I want to do with people or person, But like I think it's so important for me. Also I love not speaking.

Yeah. When you don't have to articulate it. So you, that bit, you know, when you get off the plane, you get in a taxi or on a bus or whatever. And you're seeing things that you've never seen before ever because it's a new place. You're like a baby, literally seeing things the first time. And you don't have to vocalise the word, wow, look at that. And you can just feel it. There's something so liberating about that.

And you realize your capacity for awe inside. Yeah. What an amazing thing. It's great. I remember for my mum's six. There was this really beautiful hotel that's like right on the port in Portugal that I had gone to a few times on my own and I was like, Mom for you 60th, I'm going to take you. And I did. But I was so used to, I was so attached to the place as a solo holiday that we were like sitting and it was beautiful view.

We were having breakfast and my mum was just like, meammy, meo, me, me. And then she was like, why don't you want to talk to me? And I was just a bit like, I just want to be silent. I just I just got nothing to do with you I just want to be silent I understand and I think my mum

does listen to this podcast and she won't mind me saying there was a retreat I always like to go once a year on my own in Mexico and for me it's just a really special time where I do my yoga

my meditation I go for my walks and even if I'm having a margarita I'm having it on my own as I watch the sunset and one year my mum needed a holiday and she hadn't been away for so long

I was like come on you come with me and I love her so much and she needed that holiday but it changed And she knew, she knew after a few days, she was like, you need to be on your own, don't you? Yes, I do. Because you talk a lot, mum.

You talk a lot. This is it? I was just like, oh, Mom, I just want to be something. We digress a little, but look, I can relate, hard to relate. I really love the way you talked about the characters in this book and how attached you became to them. When you read, especially because of the work you do, do you find yourself really focusing in on those characters. I think so, but I think it depends on how they're written, you know. So I think it's very dependent on the writer.

So, yeah, I guess maybe the books that really, I get really attached to is when it's written by an author that knows how to write characters, who will become a great, or it probably is a great screenwriter or playwright, but it becomes important to me to kind of be attached, and that's what makes me love a book. It's not one of my five, but I read New Animal. Have you read that book, New Animal? No, I haven't.

Okay, you should. You looked really shifty for a second there. That was because I was like, you were going to say. Because I was like I'm about to give another book. No, no, you can, in a way you can. Yeah, Ella Baxter. And that's another debut, right? But I remember loving it so much. And I sent it to another friend of mine to read. And she was like, it was okay. But for me, I was so invested in that lead character's journey and what was happening to her. And she was navigating grief in such a way. And I felt so, I was grieving with her. And again, I was just

like, this person, I need to go through this with this person. And I'm so, you know, this, I'm in this battle with you and I need your dad to come and you know, all of that. So I guess it is, it is about the characters, makes it such a beautiful experience for me when I'm reading. Well, and we've gone on so many journeys throughout this podcast and you have so many facets as well to your career that we've

discussed. What is next for you? I don't know. It's a nice way to be, you know. I really love, I don't know and I took some time to get comfortable with I don't know. You're saying that, yeah. But yeah, and as soon as I got comfortable, it was, I don't do resolutions, but I do these kind of headlines for the

year and there was one year where I said this year I want to get comfortable if I don't know and I'm so comfortable I don't know good because we always feel so pressure to have it all figured out and it's like we were saying about your job title yeah for like you caring so much about other people's perceptions of that I don't need to care yeah it doesn't matter yeah yeah I got some cool personal things happening this year but but professionally I don't know and that's that's also you know there's a lot of joy in that more life more books yeah if you did have to choose one book from your list that you brought to date as a favourite, which one would it be and why? Crying in H-Mart.

I think because it has a personal effect on me. Yeah. I feel like a lot of people having heard the way you spoke about that book and the impact that it had on you, they're listening now, will be reaching for that. I should. To read. And this has been just an absolute joy. Yeah, absolutely loved it.

Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you. I'm Vic Hope, and you've been listening to the Women's Prize for Fiction podcast. This podcast is brought to you by Bayleys and produced by Birdline Media. Thank you so much for listening and I'll see you next time.