Desert Island Dicks - IVAN WISE

Episode Date: November 22, 2018

My guest for this week is the host of the Better Known podcast, Ivan Wise. Be sure to follow the podcast @dickspod Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

At Sierra, discover top workout gear at incredible prices, which might lead to another discovery. Your headphones haven't been connected this whole time. Awkward. Discover top brands at unexpectedly low prices. Sierra, let's get moving. This is the sound of your ride home with dad after he caught you vaping. Awkward, isn't it? Most vapes contain seriously addictive levels of nicotine and disappointment. Know the real cost of vapes. to you by the fda hi i'm james deacon and welcome to desert island dicks the show that sees you marooned on a desert

island after a plane crash with the worst people and worst things imaginable. Who they are and why they're a dick is up to you. And here to share their Desert Island Dicks with us today is host of the Better Known podcast, Ivan Wise. How are you, Ivan? I'm fine. Well, at least I was fine until I submitted to do this programme. And you begin to realise that there are all these sorts of things out there that you have a loathing for and can't stand. And it gives you a bit of a different complexion on the universe.

I suddenly realised I'm a more negative, bitter person than I thought was possible. Oh, no, I didn't mean to do that to you. But it's fine. I mean, even this morning I was driving near the village where I live and I saw one of those old-fashioned coaches, so dilapidated, about 20 years old.

And it's one of those ones that says executive travel on to make it look like, I don't know what these executives are. This one was even worse. It had five stars on it. First class VIP. and it's one of those ones that says executive travel on to make it look like, I don't know what these executives are. This one was even worse. It had five stars on it. First class VIP. I didn't see anyone there who was working in an executive position. Okay, I see.

I don't know how you can advertise that that's what it is if that's just not what it is. Well, if I'd known the guy who ran the company, he would be one of my options tonight. But I just don't know his name, unfortunately. Right, I see. OK, Ivan, as always, Ivan, who's going to be a first person? My first choice is a Russian czar called Ivan the Terrible. Ivan the Terrible.

OK, interesting. I first became aware of him at a very young age when quasi-humorous adults, knowing that my name was Ivan, would then suggest that maybe I was a relation or that I was him reincarnated. Now, he was from the 16th century. Yeah. And unless you believe in reincarnation, it seems very unlikely that we had any formal link.

Yeah. But I've been aware of this person all my life. And I was concerned about putting him on the island because there's only going to be me and three other people. So if two of them are called Ivan, when you've got a slightly unusual name, you get a bit resentful of people who've got the same name as you anyway.

If you've got a relatively normal name, you just get used to it, but it happens fairly infrequently. So I became aware of it at a young age and ever since then, I've really had a deep loathing of the man. So what sort of age are we talking about here? So I was probably four years old

when I first became aware of him. I didn't read his biographies until a slightly later date. It's quite a dark story, Ivan the Terrible's life. He was, in fact, the fourth Ivan to lead Russia. The first was called Ivan the Moneybags,

rich guy. Right, okay. The second one was Ivan the Fair. And the third one, which no one ever mentioned to me when I was four, was called Ivan the Great. Oh, that's good.

So that's much better. And the reason he was great is because he tripled the territory of the Fair. And the third one, which no one ever mentioned to me when I was four, was called Ivan the Great. Oh, that's good. So that's much better. And the reason he was great is because he tripled the territory of the state. And there's actually a big building next to the Kremlin in Moscow named after him with the unfortunate name

of Ivan the Great Bell Tower. So if you read that wrong, it sounds like it's an insult. But Ivan the Fourth, Ivan the Terrible. So his name in Russian is Ivan Grozny, which actually translates

as Ivan the Formidable. So there is a kind of a more positive spin than terrible. So his name in Russian is Ivan Grozny, which actually translates as Ivan the Formidable. So there is a kind of a more positive spin than terrible. And his main kind of contribution to the world was, if you go to Red Square in Moscow, then the big cathedral there, the Cathedral of St. Basil, which is the famous one with the onion domes on, he built that in the 1550s. So that is a big legacy that he's had, it's been there for 450 years. Did he feel compelled to look up his history because of being called Ivan the Terrible as a child?

I think when you become aware of a famous person at a young age, I didn't do it immediately. As I said, I couldn't, I don't think I could read when I first heard of him. So it would have been odd to start looking for his biographies in the library. But over time, because the jokes in a way never stop. Okay. Even today, it's still funny. I don't know if you've got any famous people that share the same

name as you. James. Well, James Deacon. Not that I know of, no. No, okay. Well, maybe there is. But anyway, but I began to find out more about him. So he set up the Oprychniki, which was the original KGB. So he was in there with the secret police from the beginning. As a child, he liked to throw animals off buildings. He used to execute people even before he got power. He bulled his treasurer to death in a cauldron

because he'd done the budget wrong. Oh, my God. He got married a number of times. He used to held beauty contests to select his brides. But when he got bored of the beauty contest, he'd go off and do a beheading and an impaling just to kind of keep him engaged just just to make sure he's still a man of people i think he just got bored quite easily had quite a short attention span and um every few minutes he just needed to do something to kind of liven himself

up he used to put his enemies into cannons and fire them off in the direction of poland oh my god he's not a nice guy, and I really fear, if I was on a desert island with him, that just for lack of alternatives, he would want to do one of these punishments to me. So it would be a hideous thing to be stuck with him for eternity. My next question was going to be, do you think you have any similar personality traits

that Ivan the Terrible? I hope that you don't. I'm not aware that I do. He was quite a delusional man as well. When became drunk uh or when he fornicated with other women which he did a lot he believed that it was god who was getting drunk or fornicating through him i that's not something i've ever felt myself um and um so he was quite a violent person it was a very violent time there was a big fire in moscow 1947 and members of his own family got um so his uh his uncle was stoned to death in the cathedral in front of the head of

the church um the the mob demanded that ivan's grandmother be put to death as a witch so to some extent the context of the time maybe his behavior wasn't all that uh unusual but um i don't think any of his character traits are ones i I would like to say that I share. As if people just used to go around doing that, and that was just commonly accepted as something people got up to. It was a different time then. He had ultimate power. He could do what he liked, and the ordinary

people had very little authority. His first wife died quite young, which is why he started having these bridal contests later on, and he didn't want to talk about it and unfortunately the Vatican sent over an audience to him about 20 years later and no one had told them that his wife

had died. So they brought all these wonderful presents for Anastasia and he had to say actually she's no longer with us. So he had some personal setbacks along the way, but I'm not convinced that justifies some of the more heinous acts that he committed i don't think so no it sounds terrible and so when other people in your

class maybe i've got a name of somebody maybe more maybe there's someone in your class called martin or martin luther king uh you know someone like that when that's the person you're being compared to by every quasi humorous adult who thinks they're saying it for the first time you can see how you can see how it has some level of impact over that yeah okay i see who are these adults as well because were you terrible as a child well that was one of their their first lines actually yeah and if i had the wit to say actually the word grosney officially translated as formidable uh you've actually made a linguistic error that uh i feel that he's correct now unfortunately i didn't have the wit to do that as a four-year-old.

I do now, but it doesn't have so much impact on me now. No, OK. So a good child, then? I was reasonably well-behaved, I think. So I certainly didn't grow up in a climate of 1540s Moscow. Very different conditions, I think, in the 1980s. But what I would say is that what I felt very strongly

about as soon as it became clear that this wasn't going to end is that I would seek to find out as much as I could about this man so that I could correct people on point of accuracy if nothing else. Nice, okay. You've got that in your back pocket. Ivan the Terrible's time makes

the times that we live in seem quite dull. They are dull. They're also much, much better and safer and nicer and more comfortable and pleasant. So I think that's it. One of the reasons I've always been interested in history is it's very easy to assume that what life is like now here today is what life has always been like in every country at every time. But obviously it doesn't take long to find out that that's not the case and if you read about history through individual people you suddenly realize they've had ridiculous amounts of power or just authority to do anything and there's been no consequences and i think he ruled until his death and there wasn't suddenly

some tribunal or some some some court because obviously he owned the courts yeah he owned the secret police uh the operaative sneakers I mentioned. And they used to go around. They dressed in black, which is good. I like the stylistic point. They used to hang dogs' heads from the bridles on their horses. So they made it very clear that they've got dogs' heads, so they're getting human heads next.

Now, it's hard to imagine that in present-day Hertfordshire. No, you get it. It's true. Yeah, you can't imagine. Like, dogs' heads. Why did they think, okay, we could kill a dog? I suspect it wasn't just because they could kill a dog,

but I suspect when they then went to find the people who they'd been sought to go and look out, they had a bit more of a threatening image than if they were dressed in just kind of some

kind of fluffy uniform with ribbons on their horse. A dog's head makes you think whoever's riding that horse is going to get what they want, and it's probably better they give them the information that they need. Oh, this is good. This is good. Ivan the Terrible. Wow.

Actually, thinking about it, if those adults had thought about what they were actually saying to you, it's quite nasty to be calling a kid Ivan the Terrible. Well, there wasn't a child in my class called Joseph, but had there been, would they have said, all right, Stalin? Okay, I don't think so. I mean, I don't think they would have done it.

I don't think they would have. Because I think, because Stalin is relatively recent in our history. I mean, it was on a much bigger scale, his killing, but also obviously leading the same nation. And I think that would have been deemed unacceptable. So maybe it's because more time has passed, or maybe these adults weren't particularly clued up

on exactly what they were talking about. I mean, none of them were professors of Russian history, as far as I'm aware. I definitely didn't get that impression. But there's certainly a cut-off point whereby once you go further back in time, it's more acceptable to make light of misery and tragedy and so forth, which is a policy I entirely approve of,

except when it's inflicted upon me. Yeah, OK. All right. Ivan the Terrible is going to be your first choice. Anything else on Ivan the Terrible? No, I think I've hopefully given an impression of the sort of man he was. He had nothing to stop him from punishing his enemies. He was all ego.

He was all about belittling others. And when you think about a desert island situation where you haven't necessarily got food or water supply you've got no necessarily hope of being rescued can you imagine every single evening having to when you're going to sleep thinking well what a minute maybe tonight's the night he gets a a rage to uh to find me out of his cannon if he's kept one with him in his hand luggage on the airplane um and uh i just think it would make for a very unrelaxing campfire okay yeah it would be amazing you don't need two ivans on the island and i think that's where i started from i just think it would be it would be extremely annoying if when somebody said the name ivan we then weren't sure which one of us

we were looking at that's gonna be the most annoying so we'd have to nickname him yeah which one do you mean do you mean the terrible stroke, or do you mean his kind of more recent imitator? ITT or IW. Yeah, it's an insult, isn't it? Okay, so Ivan Trouble goes on as your first person on the island. Ivan, who's going to be your second person? My second choice is the novelist Evelyn Waugh. Evelyn Waugh.

Now, I should begin by saying that Evelyn Waugh, I think, is a great novelist. I've read lots of his books. I think they're very funny. I think he's an excellent writer. But when I looked into him as a man, as a human being, again, I'm not sure I'd like to spend much time with him. Okay. Interesting. When I read that you had picked Evelyn Waugh as one of your choices, I did a little bit of research and I didn't uncover much.

So, please, fill me in. So again, if we're going to be all liberal and kind about it, there were some tragedies in his life. So he became a teacher when he left university, which is obviously an awful job to have to get into. I get absolutely against as well. And he hated it so much.

He was in North Wales. He was so bored. He actually tried to commit suicide, but he did it in a kind of very ridiculous way. He kind of took all his clothes off on a beach one night, started swimming out to sea, having left behind a little suicide note written in ancient Greek. That was the sort of fella he was.

Nice. But unfortunately, he got stung by a jellyfish, and he was in pain, so he just came back to shore, and that was the end of the suicide attempt. That's amazing. But, you know, obviously it's unpleasant to get in that situation. He got engaged to a woman also called Evelyn, very unfortunate coincidence.

And so he had to be called he Evelyn, she was she Evelyn. She'd already been engaged nine times before because this was the 1920s where you got engaged as soon as you'd been introduced to somebody. Anyway, unfortunately, very early on in their marriage, she had an affair with a guy she later said

she didn't even like and then they got divorced. Later on, he had a nervous breakdown. So there were a number of things that happened to him that were not very pleasant. So I say that just as a preamble to explain what he then did. So he eventually got married for the second time, married happily. And he had seven children. But the way he spoke about his children, I think think wouldn't come up to modern standards of fatherhood. So he said that during the

Blitz, so this is after the Second World War, I was asked if I wanted to have my books or my son evacuated to the safety of the countryside. I chose my books because many of them are irreplaceable, but I could always have another son. Wow! Really? And of course the important thing with someone like Evelyn Roy is he was famous for being funny,

he was an ironic writer, he was a for being funny. He was an ironic writer. He was a satirist. So did he mean that? I don't know. OK. But he did say a lot of other things that make you think, well, he certainly had a bit of an obsession with not liking his children.

So when his children became of school age, he would openly rejoice at the end of the holidays because then they were going back to school. He didn't have to talk to them. There was a famous story during the Second World War. So obviously, very little fruit coming out of the country. He didn't have to talk to them. There was a famous story during the Second World War. So obviously very little fruit coming in and out of the country. He got hold of four bananas. And so he got that out at breakfast in front of all of his children.

He had, I think, six or seven children. His children had never seen such an exotic fruit before. And he then kind of puts them on a bowl. He then starts putting sugar on it and cream. And then in front of them eats all four bananas. Which it just seems a bit of an it seems a calculatively sadistic thing yeah a bit unkind uh and there just seems a bit of a pattern of that sort of behavior where he said my idea of fatherhood is is being in abyssinia so now

ethiopia sending a telegram saying to your wife have you had your child yet and what have you called it so i don't think we can call him a modern modern man definitely not maybe there are some modern men who'd like to be like that, but possibly not him, possibly not today. But he was generally unpleasant, not just to his children. So when his friend Randolph Churchill, I think the son of Winston Churchill, became ill, there was an infection in his lungs.

Fortunately, Randolph was found to be OK. It was found to be not malignant. And he said it was a typical triumph for modern science to find the only part of Randolph Churchill that was not malignant and then remove that. Wow. So, yeah, again, great one-liners.

Did he mean it? Did he not mean it? He's obviously a very intelligent man. I think, case in point, the bananas and cream story, I think there's part of him that does does mean what he says in these quotes i think so and obviously there's a difference when it's just something you say as a joke and something you actually then do i mean from what i understand the root of him was he was just he was a very

bored person as he again maybe like my first choice got easily bored so uh when he was at school he founded something called the corpse club which is not quite as bad as you think it's for people who are bored stiff. So essentially this was the defining aspect of his life, that he just got very easily bored and he was constantly seeking interest and entertainment and doing something. What did the bored stiff people do in this club?

I think they just all sat there together and just kind of hoped for the end. Moan about everything. But a friend of his said that he was constantly suffering from ennui, so the French version of being bored. And he said it was just a major affliction for him. about everything. But a friend of his said that he was constantly suffering from ennui, so the French version of being bored. And he said it was just a major affliction for him. He was constantly looking for something to enliven him.

But I don't think he got on very well with other people, partly because of this malicious side to him. He was in the army in the Second World War and Fitzroy Maclean, who was one of the people he served with, said his entire military career, he never met an officer so loathed by the men who served under him. So there is a bit of a pattern of people close to him saying that he that he wasn't a nice guy. I mean, interestingly, his own children did seem to quite like him.

So Oberyn War, who was one of his children, wrote to him kind of towards the end of his life where he said, just a line to tell you what. For some reason, I was never able to show you in my lifetime that I admire, revere and love you more than any other man in the world so i mean i don't know if his son was suffering from some awful stockholm syndrome or some other thing despite everything but all the banana is delirious yeah so um so so you know his children i think were a bit more fond of him but um as i say if you assume that the context of some of these comments is genuine you just think again okay so i'm stuck on this desert island for months years who knows how long it will be and this guy finds it amusing and is easily bored so needs to find things amusing all the time to belittle undermine do practical jokes do everything he can to make your life awful and will never kind of you know look

for forgiveness i mean interestingly he was a catholic, and he said that if it wasn't for his Catholicism, he'd be an appalling human being. So he thinks that his religion was the only thing that gave him any kind of level of decency at all. But as my examples may suggest, I'm not sure that there was any. No, I think from my light research, I did read that he... When I say light research, I mean I went on Wikipedia. But when I looked on Wikipedia,

it said that he spent a lot of his time drinking and partying yeah i mean he died uh relatively young i think um early 60s and certainly by the time he was 50 he'd kind of become a very much a kind of country gent he was quite portly um and he very much liked the you know the kind of club environment other men's company kind of drinking and so forth so no doubt his health wasn't that good either. But he did over his life alienate a lot of people, including those very close to him. And as I say, although I think the books he wrote are hilarious, genuinely hilarious, which is very rare. Normally books after 90, 100 years are not funny, like human dates, like nothing else.

So as a writer, I think he's phenomenal. And I would recommend to read his books on a desert island, but I wouldn't necessarily want him there with me. No, of course, yeah. That would probably get quite great in after a while. I think so. Anything else on Evelyn Waugh? No, I don't think so.

Okay, all right. Thank you very much, Ivan. That's going to be a second person. And who's going to be a third person on the island? My third person, like both the first two, is also no longer with us, so they going to be a second person. And who's going to be the third person on the island? My third person, like both the first two, is also no longer with us, so they will not be able to sue.

Nice choice. It's Margaret Thatcher. Margaret Thatcher. Dare I ask why? Everybody has an opinion on Margaret Thatcher. She is one of those people that even people who were born

after she left office not only have heard of, but have lots of ideas and views on. So I wouldn't try and take a particularly strong political view on her either way. I think, again, she's just a profoundly unpleasant person to be around, from what I can gather. And just the idea of having to spend any time one-on-one with her, let alone extended periods of time, I think would be horrendous.

Plus, I think it would just be interesting to see the political fight for power that would obviously emerge between Margaret Thatcher and Ivan the Terrible, because both of them were masters of their political game in different environments. Would she be prepared to use some of the tactics that Ivan IV did? To bring him down. Well, that's what I'm interested to know. So it's partly I'd just be interested to get those two together and set them off and see whether, as I've always believed, that she was kind of reined in by the fact it would be unacceptable

to boil your treasurer or your chance of exchequer in a cauldron or fire them off in a cannon. But in the lawlessness of a desert island, would she, with such an opposition as that, stoop to that level or even go beneath? And I'd be fascinated to find that out. Maybe the lawlessness of the island, but also should she have lived in Ivan the Terrible's time,

would she have been up to the similar sort of thing? I think if, as a woman, she'd been given any power at all, I suspect that she wouldn't have been permitted to seek high political office. But certainly... No, true. That's true. Certainly with that kind of caveat aside, it would be fascinating to know.

It's obviously one of those counterfactuals we can never know, but I suspect strongly that he might be interested in that, yes. Where's Evelyn Waugh in this argument? Interestingly, I think Evelyn Waugh would probably be the most pleasant of the three of them. I mean, I think he would no doubt be doing all he could to play them off against each other,

undermine them, maybe try and form alliances. So he's a bit of a loose cannon. I don't know where this leaves me, by the way. No, I know. That's what I was thinking. I think I'm just going to observe and hopefully run away and swim for it. Provided there were no jellyfish to sting me.

So I don't quite know how he'd get involved. But really, my issue with her is several things. So firstly, I think a complete lack of self-awareness. So it's quite standard for politicians to be drunk on their own ambition and glory, because really, why would you go for these top jobs unless you really believe you are the best? Sure. But she was someone who throughout her career talked a lot about people making good on their own and being self-made. And she was obviously famous for perhaps being slightly less than sympathetic to some of the people in society who didn't have that much to begin with.

But yet she believed in herself of a myth of a self-made person. So she talked a lot about how her father was a grocer and owned a grocery shop in Grantham in Lincolnshire, where she grew up, which was true. But he was also the mayor of Grantham. He was also chairman of governors of the girls' grammar school. So he wasn't as unconnected as she made out. Then in a very young, the night, in fact, she was elected or she was chosen to be the candidate, Tory candidate for Dartford. She met Dennis Thatcher, her future husband, who was a multimillionaire. He'd made a family fortune. And there was,

as far as I could gather, very little self-awareness that she herself had only succeeded because of these advantages. But yet she was not the first to extend those advantages or be sympathetic to others who didn't have them. Right. I see. Interesting. OK, so hiding aspects of her past and only highlighting the parts that made her seem more favourable. I think so. And she was a real bully as well. So, again, it'd be fascinating to see how she'd take on the other two. So her first head of policy unit when she became prime minister said you break every rule of man management, you bully your weaker colleagues, you criticise colleagues in front of each other,

in front of their officials, you give little praise or credit, you're too ready to blame others. Her principal private secretary said she was like feeding, talking to her was like feeding a fierce animal. Wow. So a lot of those people who worked with her found her very bullying, very dogmatic.

And she obviously made that part of her image that the lady's not for turning, that she was very much a person of her principles. But again, I just think as somebody to actually do business with, to go, look, are you going to go and get the fruit today? Are you going to go and do the fishing today? No, yes, of course. Sure, I'd enjoy dealing with that sort of person. I feel like these three characters that you've chosen are going to be ordering you about the island. I think I'm not going to be able to stay on this island for very long. I'm going to have to hide on another bit of the island where they're not.

Absolutely. And again, just to give a... So various unpleasant things happened to her. So two of her close friends were killed by the IRA, Aerie Neve and Ian Gow. Her husband, Dennis, had a nervous breakdown. He went to South Africa to recover for two months

so you know again there were lots of struggles in her life but I think as is the theme today we're not going to forgive people just because they have a hard time True, yeah

that's a good point I think we're going to judge them by what they do she was quite hypocritical I think about her role of women so obviously first female prime minister she only ever brought one woman

into the cabinet she had a little soundbite in politics if you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done, ask a woman. But she didn't actually employ any women to do any of the doing. So how much did she really believe that? That famous catchphrase I mentioned earlier, the lady's not for

turning. She said that another point, being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, then you aren't. But then obviously she did tell people in the lady's not for turning catchphrase. Yes. So there's again a bit of a contradiction there about where did she really stand on women? Was she pro them?

She said she was much more proud of being the first science graduate prime minister than the first female prime minister. So you doubt whether she was that interested in equality or issues of that nature. Interesting. Used her advantage as and when she felt. I think so. I think she was a very adversarial person. She really hated the idea of consensus. So if you think one thing and I think the other, rather than as most politicians do, you try and meet in the middle.

Her view was you're completely wrong and I'm completely right. Well, that'd be difficult. And it would be difficult when you're trying to dig a hole in the ground. You're trying to build a trench. You're trying to build shelter. And even worse than that, I don't even know if she even did that. So she had this very adversarial point of view, but then she contradicted it lots of times. So she said that after the terrible IRA bomb in Brighton in 1984,

how they would never engage with the IRA, but there were back channels for years, which may have been the right decision, but let's not claim that we're absolutely not talking to the other side and then doing that at the same time. So there were a lot of contradictions about her. And she's obviously one of those figures that a lot of people today love still, I think.

I think there is still quite a significant section of people who wish she came back from the dead or that she was reincarnated. I don't know how much there is of that in Russia for rather than terrible. But there's always been a big section of people who hated, obviously people whose livelihoods and towns got destroyed by mining cuts and by benefits, structural changes and so forth. So I think a lot of people don't like it.

But I think she played on the fact that if you're really adversarial and you make out that you're really on people's side, then they will come to you. And I just think that makes probably her a very unpleasant person to play cards with or to go for a walk with on a Sunday. Yes, okay. And you don't know how much that spilled into a private life

and with all these people, obviously, I only know them. I didn't, I have to be honest, know any of these people personally. So I'm only guessing on what they were like in private but when people who knew them day to day were being quite critical of them, then you have to give some credit to that i think okay interesting margaret thatcher for all of the reasons above um you've set yourself up here for quite the island so far well i'm very much hoping that we're rescued yes i'm very much hoping that the other three just managed to have a battle and kind of um destroy themselves i would much rather i, if I'm honest, spend a year alone on this island, maybe five years alone than with these two people.

Yeah, I'll force your hand, yes. I think Evelyn War of the Three of Them is the only one who I think I could potentially get on with after a few brandies in the right sort of mood. The other two I think I would struggle with. Okay, so Margaret Thatcher. Anything else on Margaret Thatcher? No. Okay. No. Okay. Thank you very much, Ivan. one across thousands of shows to reach your target audience with lips and ads go to lips and ads.com now that's l-i-b-s-y-n ads.com ivan now mercifully among the wreckage of the plane there was some food and drink left over unfortunately for you it's your least favorite food and drink in the

world what are they and why are they so bad my food choice food first is coleslaw. Coleslaw. And I think the reason is, is because I don't know what it's for. Ah. So like many people, I think I had coleslaw. I think as I recall, it was a bit of a standard at school. I think it goes back that far. And I remember when I first saw it, I was like, is this some protein?

Or maybe I didn't think of those terms in that age. But is it equivalent? Is it a meat substitute? Is it a potato thing? Is it just salad? Yeah. Or is it really none of the above? Is it a sauce?

Is it a sprinkling thing? Is it a sauce? And it really just didn't seem to fit into any category. And again, it's a problem when you pick something, an item of food that you have maybe when you're younger, and you probably get a lower quality version of it. I'm sure there's some great coleslaw made i'm sure there's some great chefs out there who can rustle up a mean coleslaw but my my early exposure to it over a number of

times where you know i was forced to eat it as you often are when you're when you're eating at school when you're young it was it was a nothing food it had no point it was quite bland or it was just a bit horrible it didn't seem to add any nutrition right and whenever you saw it as the food on the day on the menu on the you know when you went up to get it you felt slightly less happy about the rest right okay interesting so you know in with with due respect to coleslaw i try to find out a little bit about what it is because okay like obviously lots of food i'm sure your guests choose i've not had it for a long time because what's great about being an adult is you don't have to eat food i think um george hw bush said that about broccoli he said now i'm president i'm not

going to eat broccoli ever again i'm not i'm not president but i'm not going to eat coleslaw so it is basically shredded raw cabbage with salad dressing i think but that sounds quite boring but then i looked up and said lots of international coleslawers don't have cabbage. No. Apparently they have kind of cabbage substitutes. Carrot or something else. Carrot. And they don't have to have mayonnaise either.

They can have something else that's a bit similar. So it's one of those things that I think is a little bit in the eye of the beholder. So I'm sure it's possible to do it well because you can just basically put in any ingredient that you want. But my experience, it was very possible to do it badly. Yes. And it didn't really taste of anything very nice.

It was a bit cold and a bit... And salad generally, I have a bit of an issue with, I think, standard salad, because I don't really see why people are eating it. Is it nice? Is it making them healthier? I think it isn't. I think it's just one of those foods

that doesn't make you any fatter and doesn't make you ill. So people just kind of have it for that. Interesting. So I don't really like salad generally, but coleslaw specifically is something that I would rather, if essentially, which is I think the premise of this question, it's all I'm going to have forever. Forever, yeah.

This is unacceptable. Okay. I'll be catching fish. But the coleslaw that you'd get at school, I imagine it would be quite dry, no sauce. Would it be like that? I think that's right. And I think like other things that you have at that age,

maybe like semolina, I don't know if you remember that. It's quite easy never to have them again. So I'm fully aware that I might be having an eight-year-old's view of it that's out of date because my tastes have matured, let me tell you, and also the quality of the cooking may have improved. I think, I'm sure i'm going out to places and i'm having like a say a cafe having a sandwich and it comes with a little side salad or something there's often coleslaw on there no

well possibly i mean i think i'm not eating it if there is right okay or maybe they've disguised it so well that i'm not noticing it um so as i say it's odd with these sort of things because food is such a evocative thing it kind of reminds you of where you were when you had it and because I've not had it in so many years

I think it's possible that I'm not aware I've had it I certainly didn't order the thing on the menu saying I want coleslaw they might have given it to me without me knowing

that I'm still stuck in this kind of old view of it so I'm very happy to have my view updated no doubt if I'm eating it three times a day on an island, I'll be forced to do that.

You probably will, yeah. So maybe if I'm absolutely specific, what I mean is the thing I really don't want to do is the coleslaw that I had when I was eight with my eight-year-old's mindset about it, if you can manage that. Whenever, you know, I'm with you, yeah. I mean, just whenever we're getting coleslaw.

So I do have coleslaw at home with things, not that often, to be honest, or when I'm out. But I think when you see, when you pick it up in the supermarket have coleslaw at home with with things not that often to be honest or when i'm out but i think when you see when you pick it up in the supermarket and now it has the little bars that tell you um what's the amount of fat amount of salt and all that kind of stuff i think coleslaw is really bad for you now it's full of cream and and mayo and stuff it doesn't even have that going for it no it doesn't it's definitely not healthy okay coleslaw is going to be your food choice. And what's going to be your drink choice?

My drink is something I call worm medicine. Yeah, what is this then? So I was one of four children. Yep. And when you're a child, you have perhaps more relaxed attitudes towards hygiene than you is an adult. And so you occasionally get this thing called worms,

which is actual worms that are visiting parts of the body. I know about this. Yes. And when you've got, you know, several brothers and sisters, then you can catch it quite easy between you if you don't wash your hands properly. I mean, it's sensible. And as adults, we know better, but as children, maybe not.

Anyway, and so I have a strong recollection of being a young child again i'm sorry so many of these go back to that no no they often do this this freudian um thing you're doing here is good is that you come downstairs and then my dad would say um uh well he wouldn't even say it would just be put out the worm medicine so the specific medicine which would be in it would put it in a cup so it would look like a drink and that's why I've perhaps slightly cheatingly put it in this category but you'd have to drink it back.

So it was a drink size. It wasn't just like a shot or a tiny amount and it was this very unpleasant purple brownish colour I guess. So it looked odd.

It looked like not what a drink of any sort should taste like. You then would pick it up which you never did straight away because you'd have to get used to the look of it.

And then it would smell foul, toxic, very, very unpleasant. And obviously, even before you got to drinking it, it was a bit of a, well, whose fault is this then? So it would be accompanied by a little bit of a guilt and horrible feeling. Yeah, pointing fingers. Well, actually, this is not my fault.

I'm only doing this because of you. So you're having to do this unpleasant thing and then you're engaging a not very constructive to family wellbeing, pointing the finger at the person who's brought this worms into the family. Now, I cite this one because I've never had this thing, floxacillin, which is a kind of more modern drug. I think this didn't exist when I was a child.

It wasn't so widely prescribed. And my daughter's had that a couple of times for when she's had infections or I think tonsillitis. And she assured me that, not that she's had the worm medicine but this is even worse and the modern equivalent of worm medicine is much better so many things it's much better to be a child now than it was just bad place in time bad place no i mean if you're around in the terrible day then there was nothing and you just die but um or you just get overridden by worms so so it's the sight of it then it's the smell then it's the finger pointing

yeah and then it's the well let's just get this over with so you you have like with any unpleasant drink um two choices really you can either kind of do it a bit slowly or you can down it but it's a big enough drink that's quite hard to down it's not as i say kind of 50 or 100 milliliters it's probably 200 milliliters now i never saw the I don't know if that was actually the dosage or my dad just went, let's just give him a proper dosage so it doesn't come back. Probably need to check that with him. And so my recollection is this occurred every few months,

maybe over a year or two. There was a kind of peak age for this to happen. And so I tried different tactics. But I think the worst one was when I did try and down it because it was too big a drink to down that's far too difficult to do when you're that age and so inevitably you spill a little bit and then

oh dear you're going to have to have a bit more so you're feeling awful you've obviously got some sort of food or another pleasant drink to kind of wash it down with but it's like oh actually we have to do a second round of it because you've only had 180ml that's not quite enough to destroy these um worms that you may or may not have in your own body so it's just it was very unpleasant and obviously again i've not had this for years the modern equivalent is much better and i'm relying on very um kind of

old memories of what this was like but when i thought thought of your question, what's the worst drink? I really tried to think of other drinks. I just thought this is the thing I'd like, at least like to have. Yeah, the worst thing that you can have for the rest of your life. Oh my God. It sounds horrible.

Do you think that there's part of it that your parents were like, look, we really want you to take on board that you need to try and not get this again. We're going to give you another bit if you spill a little bit. I mean, I suspect they took no pleasure from the process either because to some extent as the parent you're in,

you're probably the one that uncovers it. You're probably the one who kind of then realizes, okay, we've got to wash all the clothes and towels immediately. Sheets, all that sort of thing. It's quite a task. I'm sure there was an element of lecture about it and I'm sure it didn't displease them that it was so unpleasant that that in itself was obviously quite a um disincentive to get it but as i say often

i mean you'd never get it deliberately anyway and often it wasn't you individually it was your you know your damn brother yeah specifically your brother um okay and as well you're gonna have to deal with that for the rest of your life that's horrible okay um dare i ask anything else on worming medicine i think that's plenty that's it yeah okay thank you very much ivan all right we'll have some more from ivan after this ivan fortunately for you you won't be without entertainment on the island the planes entertainment system continues to work but just your luck it only has two working settings one is your least favorite film of all time the other is your least favorite song what are they and why i really like films and music and i generally only watch films that i'm expecting to like so read reviews and stuff like that so actually it's quite rare

that i see a film i really dislike okay so the film i've chosen is a film called jay and silent bob strike back yes I saw this. So, I don't think I've ever seen this. Tell me about Jay and Silent Bob. Well, my first piece of advice is do not go and see it. The context in which I saw it was, so it's directed by, it came out 2001, directed by a guy called Kevin

Smith, who did a few films in the kind of late 90s that I loved, really loved. I recognise his name. Really funny films. Ben Affleck's in a few of them before Ben Affleck became a superhero but I think it's very funny. Lots of kind of

very sharp humour. The first one called Clark's or I think Clerks in America. Black and White made for $60,000. Big kind of breakout hit. He did one called Chasing Amy.

Really, really funny. It's brilliantly written. And he did another one called Dogma which was about God interestingly. Yes, I've seen that. And I really liked all of those

and so I went to the cinema to see this film with high expectations and that's the context that is important for this because if I'd seen it with no context it would maybe have just been another bad film. It was so much worse than the other four films by such an unbelievable category of awfulness that I have many times subsequently told people

who like the other films please don't see it often they've seen it anyway and agreed that it was terrible so the first problem with it is that it's got enough elements

of the original films you like that you from the beginning you kind of hope there's a bit of hope there and what I mean by elements is he literally

just has the same characters but he starts getting a bit meta because he has characters from one film and then another film come in so already there's a bit of a sense that But he starts getting a bit meta because he has characters from one film and then another film come in. So already there's a bit of a sense that this is going up a bit up.

Yeah, it's a, yeah. So that's the first thing. It's lazy because it's using elements of previous films to kind of lull you in, but then it's doing something boring. And then it's just, it goes into farce. So there's all sorts of kind of in-jokes, but in-jokes are really inexpertly delivered.

There's a bit where Ben Affleck, who did the films originally because he was friends with Kevin Smith, says to camera, sometimes you do films to help out a friend and sometimes you do films for a bit of money. And he's literally laughing at you as the paying member of the audience. Right, OK. And I remember thinking, is there any way that I can just contact him directly for my money back?

Wow. So all sorts of fairly childish things happen happen they become friends with an animal liberation group who's actually a front for a diamond heist and they are robbing the diamond heist and one of the women farts and that sets off the alarm and breaks the glass oh no okay so you know and kevin smith previously had done a bit of that sort of humor but there was enough kind of clever wordplay and kind of intelligence behind it

it's got all sorts of famous people in cameos so he'd obviously got quite into his celebrity mates by that and that's always

a bad sign when there's lots of so Matt Damon's in it Carrie Fisher's in it Chris Rock Wes Craven

Will Ferrell Matt Damon I mean loads of people who you know he'd obviously met at a party and went can you be in my film as yourself or as a version of yourself for two minutes and that's pretty depressing. Mark Hamill's in it, he's playing a comic book supervillain called Cockknocker so he's really pitching at that at that level and as I say it was because and it's always a mistake to go into any film with high expectations, because there's only really one, well, you can just about meet them all, the only one way is down.

But this was so far below my expectations and such a kind of cheap retread of these films that I liked, it then slightly poisoned the original films for me as well. And he's never really, as far as I'm aware, I've actually, I stopped seeing his films after that. Did you? I mean, not necessarily on principle. If there was something really good, I'd see it. But all his other films since then have been a bit retreads and all around. You've just got this guy who you think there was so much skill and ability and potential,

at least as I saw it. Yeah. And then this absolute farce of disastrousness. And it was awful. And if I had to see that again, well, every day, I think I'm suggesting. I don't actually mean more than once a day is it? Well I mean probably yeah

probably several times a day well you've got nothing else to do in between Thatcher The Terrible and and you know The Child Hater

eating coleslaw drinking worm heads it's just not a good evening is it? What do you think these three will think of this film? I can't imagine anyone would enjoy it I think i'm the terrible would just be interested by the idea

of the technology yes he predated that evelyn war was a very old-fashioned man he really didn't think you should go around ever without a kind of three-piece suit on very formal it's hard to imagine he'd enjoy the humor of it margaret thatcher it's it's hard to know i never got a sense if she had a sense of humor no and i expect if she did it wouldn't be on this level, it's hard to know. I never got a sense that she had a sense of humour. No. And I suspect if she did, it wouldn't be on this level. No, it's true. So the one thing we would agree on is I think we'd all dislike this film. Okay, that's good. Did you stay to the end?

Did you watch the whole thing? I did stay to the end. I think I just kept thinking maybe it will get better a bit later. It didn't. New York Times said it was maybe the greatest picture ever made for a 14-year-old boy, but this is not written by a 14-year-old boy. Kevin Smith may have hit his target, but he aimed incredibly low.

So, you know, but I think as a 14-year-old, I thought it was ridiculous. I mean, as I say, I'm a big fan of kind of levels of childish humour, but you've got to have something to go with it as well. And it's just one of those films that everybody involved in it, I think they should be made to watch it on a regular basis

to remind them that they actually got paid for something that other people paid for that has made their lives immeasurably worse. Oh, my God, that's bad. And really, other than being able to talk about it now, it's really added no constructive value to my life whatsoever. Wow. Apart from the... Well, not apart from, but you've mentioned to so many people not to watch this film.

Yeah, so I've helped them out. But how it's helped me, really, has been pretty negligible. So I think it's sad. To be honest, the worst thing about it, because I read recently, he's doing a sequel to that film. So he's already done,

which again is a bad thing, he's already done a sequel to the film Clerks, called Clerks 2, and he's going to do one called Jay and Silent Bob Reboot, which I just think no one's asking for this reboot. Maybe it won't get made, maybe it won't get financed, because I think he's slightly to do one called Jay and Silent Bob Reboot, which I just think no one's asking for this reboot. Maybe it won't get made. Maybe it won't get financed,

because I think he's slightly out of favour. But I'd be really interested to hear his justification for it, because I think he was a man of some ability who fell tragically short on that occasion. I feel so disappointed for you that you liked the other film so much and then you went to watch this and it was so bad. Yeah, and I think that's why I chose it

because there are other films I've seen that I don't like, but generally they're films that I've seen knowing I'm not going to like them. Or they're a type of film that I know isn't my thing, whereas I did think this would be good. And if I haven't made that clear already, it wasn't. OK. Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back.

Is that Strike Back and it's the first film. OK, interesting. And, Ivan, what's going to be your song choice? It's a song by the band Eiffel 65 called Slew. Slew. I feel 65 now. I know this song, Blue, and for some reason I've got the weird thing in me that if you were to put this on,

I think I could probably recall all of the lyrics, but because there's not many of them, please tell me why you picked this song. Well, in a way, this is more of a lazy choice because this is not many of them please tell me why you picked this song well in a way this is uh this is more of a lazy choice because this is not my sort of music this is this is europop this is italian europop in fact it comes from their 1990 album 1999 album europop wow so they didn't get the uh the message that actually europop is a bit of a toxic brand at least i thought it was so it's three guys all of no talent called jeffrey j maurizio labina and gabry ponte

so uh the name iphone 65 was chosen as you might imagine by a computer at random no it was selected some words and the computer chose it and the number 65 was added to it by mistake so i mean there's no backstory here it's not like oh how did they come up with it no there's nothing there's nothing at all um so there's that um i mean the reason i've chose it is because at the time i think i spent much of that summer in um places where they were playing that music so it's just imprinted itself if it came out at a period that i wasn't maybe going out as often uh you hear it once and move on right so i think again it's just evocative and i heard a lot i heard it far more often than I would choose. It's obviously an idiotic song,

and probably the people who wrote it never thought it was any better than that, in fairness to them, but it did become very successful. So let's talk about the lyrics to begin with. So it begins, yo, listen up, here's the story, which I think is a bit of an Italian, English is my second language way to begin any lyrics. I'm just not sure that somebody who learned English all their life would do that. I think maybe they needed someone to sit them down and go, actually, maybe another

way. Even Once Upon a Time would have been a lot better. It's about a little guy that lives in a blue world and all day and all night and everything he sees is blue. Blue's his house, the blue little window, the blue Corvette and everything is blue for him. So, I mean, it's some sort of delusional fantasy. Maybe the person's got psychosis.

It's not clear exactly what the problem is, But he's obviously deeply troubled and ill in some significant way. Blue are the streets and all the trees are too. I have a girlfriend. She's so blue. Blue like my Corvette. Corvette gets mentioned again. Both the first and second version. I'm not quite sure why they think people have Corvettes. Is that a normal car that people have when you're

in Italy? I'm driving a blue Corvette. So I mean, it's obviously bargain basement lyrics. But the reason that obviously it's particularly dislikable is because it is catchy, but in the most hideous way. So the chorus goes, Oh, no, come on, you know it. Well, I know it, but I don't see much value in singing it. I'm sure people can find it if they really need to,

although I would strongly discourage them from doing that. Interesting. And so it is probably one that if you've heard, you would remember. It's memorable in that extent, but it's memorable in all the worst ways. And whenever it used to come on anywhere, it would always be, well, if after a certain number of drinks,

it would be going to have a word with the DJ. Right, okay. I don't know about you, but I've only ever gone to have a word with a DJ about anything after a few drinks because I think they should be left to do their work. I think they're working, working they're professionals sure um you have to hope they're benevolent individuals okay uh it'd be interesting to see i've been terrible behind the deck session

that'd be interesting um but when they play a song like that then i think they need some feedback and even though i accept they probably won't turn it off mid-song i want to make it clear that they shouldn't be playing it again and obviously my feedback is only one person. Doubtless, the whole room is loving every second of it. Ivan, you're so authoritarian on the dance floor. But with only limited success, I should say. I mean, the DGA is obviously very welcome to say, no, this is my, you know, I can do what I like.

And lacking the weaponry of the Apricianiki of Ivan, my namesake, I don't really follow it up. So if he doesn't do what I want, there's been no response. Anyway, I haven't actually heard this song for quite a while. I'm hoping to continue that,

but I know that I'll work into a shopping mall at some point soon and some bright spot will pop it on. Well, if you listen back to this, you will have heard a very short clip of it. Really? Yeah. You don't think they might sue you?

They're just desperate for the airplay, probably. I've just read out half the lyrics. Is that a problem as well? I don't know. Did you hear this rumour that the lyrics were meant to be I'm blue, I OD'd and I died? That was meant to be a thing at one point, right? I mean, who knows whether that's valid? I mean, I think people with a lot of time on their hands

will often find messages in lyrics that have no messages because they're so lyrically inept. So it might be they were just trying to give Geoffrey, Maurizio and Gabrielle a helping hand by saying, oh, your lyrics weren't completely inept. They did have some profanity. Maybe they invented it, so at least there was some press about the song.

I suspect they just took the money and ran. So Gabrielle actually left the group in 2005. I thought you might be interested to know this. And then Geoffrey and Maurizio formed their own duo called Bloom 06. So they're going with the model of the word and then the two digits. Blue or Bloom? Bloom 06. Yeah.

Anyway, it didn't work out for Gabri. So in 2010, the three of them got back together. So they are, I think, still together. I haven't been troubled by them, but maybe i'm not listening to the right thing do you think they're still doing it then do you think i think i'm still playing that song and probably remembering the old days and what else would they play well i think they did have one other song but um today i the b-side i think he said it may have been a visa

but essentially it was a tragic waste of everybody's time and energy. And I wish it had never existed. And it's particularly the fact that they made, I'm assuming, a lot of money from making it. And so it's not just them that I hold to blame. It's the probably million people who purchased it in some form. Oh, wow. Okay. I feel 65 and blue. For some reason, when you started reading the lyrics there, I thought I might.

I knew what the next lyric was going to be, but I think it was around a time where there was a lot of discos and stuff like that, and I must have heard it about a million times, right? It was just on all the time. Yeah, and that's the problem with it, because obviously a song that's not popular, you hear it once and hate it,

and you just never hear it again. And it doesn't fill your soul with such loathing as one that is played against your will all the time. So that's why I chose it. Yes, and imagine that for the rest of your life. Awful. Okay, Eiffel 65 by Blue. Thank you very much, Ivan.

And finally, the island is overrun by the biggest dick of all the animals. Which animal is it and why? Well, this is just pure prejudice. It's the blobfish. The blobfish? The blobfish is a deep-sea fish, so I'm not quite sure the context in which the blobfish would be running anywhere, certainly not around the island.

But let's assume that we've got the seas right next to us and the blobfish is there. The blobfish is just an extremely ugly animal. It's pure prejudice. It's not that... Because I thought about, do I want to pick an animal that could kill me or suffocate me or strangle me or something like that?

And I thought, well, that's one option. But another option is just an animal that um aesthetically because looking at it would just be not very pleasant so it's quite a bulbous look i think would probably be the adjective we use to describe it um it's not something we come across in the uk very often they live um well the first they live kind of well beneath the surface they live about six to twelve hundred meters below the surface of the water okay so you don't come across them when you're swimming but anyway they're not even anywhere here. They're mostly off Tasmania, mainland Australia around there,

and a bit of New Zealand. So it's not a fish that you would normally come across by chance, either because of where it is or by the depth they go to. The pressure that they're swimming at is 100 times greater than at sea level. So the construction of their anatomy is such that they can withstand 100 times the pressure that we stand, which I believe is part of the reason for their absurd appearance. Right, OK.

But yeah, it's a kind of gelatinous mass, and its density is slightly less than water, and so this allows it to, what it does basically, float just above the seawater without expending any energy. So essentially it can move around without really using very much energy. So it's a very lazy animal. I think it wouldn't be very interested in kind of being a performer. It's not like a seal or an animal that would perform for your amusement.

It doesn't look very nice. I don't think it would be a very great nutritional value. No, yes, that's what I was going to say. Which is obviously one of the reasons why you'd want an animal to run an island I think the one plus side is it wouldn't attack me I think I'm pretty confident

well that's good so it is ahead of crocodiles and sharks and scorpions and snakes for that reason but that reason only

so it's pure bigotry I'm not just because it's so ugly I just think it would be unpleasant I mean the idea of a desert island which we all like to think of

is some sort of bliss. Bliss paradise. It's paradise. It's some place where it's beautiful sunshine, everything looks nice. Now, I've already really ruined that by the people I've chosen. Well, I've forced you to, yeah.

Yeah, no, no, it's fine. I didn't mind doing it. And so I think, really, the image is yet further undermined by this blobfish. In a way, I find them quite funny. I think maybe if I saw one, it would be funny. And then if I saw thousands surrounding me, it would just be like a nightmare.

Oh, that would be horrible. Yeah, that's nightmarish. I know what a blobfish looks like. And I urge anyone listening to this to go and search the blobfish because it is a horrific looking animal. Yeah, if there's someone who you maybe don't like at work or something, just send them a text with a blobfish. Give them a little wake up call or something like that yeah um it's it's a bit of a it's a bit of a horrible thing to wake up to i would imagine yeah okay i think you're probably right all right the blobfish is going to be your animal thank you so much for

coming in ivan no problem ivan um i already know about the better known podcast but please tell the listeners about your podcast so on the better known podcast, each week a guest chooses six things which they think should be better known. So it could be famous people, it could be a place they've been on holiday, it could be a type of food, historical event, anything like that. And then we discuss things they feel very positively about.

So in some ways, it's the mirror image of this particular... It is. It's the opposite. And I've been a guest on the podcast, which was... Thank you very much for inviting me in. And I believe that's going to be out next monday or if you're listening to this in the future then it is there it's there now on the better known podcast and people can get that on itunes anywhere and better known.co.uk better known.co.uk thank you so much ivan thank you Bye.