Off Air... with Jane and Fi - Tapestry on the Northern line (with Katriona O'Sullivan)

Episode Date: July 18, 2023

Jane and Fi chat about University Challenge and the prospect of sharing a bed.  Katriona O'Sullivan joins to speak about her memoir Poor, an insight into a life lived against the boundaries of poverty.If you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] us on Instagram! @JaneandFiAssistant Producer: Elizabeth HighfieldTimes Radio Producer: Rosie Cutler Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

VoiceOver describes what's happening on your iPhone screen. VoiceOver on. Settings. So you can navigate it just by listening. Books. Contacts. Calendar. Double tap to open. Breakfast with Anna from 10 to 11. And get on with your day. Accessibility. There's more to iPhone. Well, you can give me a ring.

I mean, just see if... I mean, if I've not got anything on. No, because you've only been over to East London once. I've been twice, actually. Have you? Yes. No, more than that, actually. Gosh, it's lovely to say you can't even remember the number once. I've been twice, actually. Have you? Yes. No, more than that, actually. Gosh, it's lovely to say. You can't even remember the number of times I've paid you a visit.

What about the time you were ill? I brought round some flowers. Oh, I remember that. Although I think the BBC paid for them. Oh, OK. Well, dear, dear licence fee payer. What a very, very, very good spend. And then I came round for lunch once.

You made a very nice salad. And then another occasion, we did a podcast with... Oh, Nigel. Yeah with... Oh, Nigel... Yeah, the cook, Nigel... Slater. He's more than a cook, I should say. He's a great writer. Nigel Slater?

Yeah. That's at least three times. And I think there's been at least one more. I can't quite place... Oh, I'm sorry. Hello, Vin, who just says, Dear Jane and Fee, Does a penny-farthing sighting in Crosby last week

qualify on two counts for being read out? Yes, it does, Vin. Thank you very much for that. sighting in Crosby last week. Qualify on two counts for being read out. Yes, it does, Vin. Thank you very much for that. Any mention of Crosby. And Vin, I hope you're old enough to reminisce, as I often do with my sister, about the Crosby Herald, which is a very important local newspaper and contains some of the best photographs.

Do you know the local newspaper Pose? Did you have a local newspaper growing up? Well, sometimes I wonder whether you're replaced by an AI bot. The Hampshire Chronicle. The Hampshire Chronicle, yeah. So the Crosby Herald, seriously, came out every week and was an absolute feast for the eye because it would have the meeting of the Towns Women's Guild

and then there'd be people sending around but they used to i can't really do it justice in words but there would be a particular pose adopted by most people in local newspaper group photographs which is slightly ill at ease basically longing for the moment to be over eager to get out of shot but nevertheless glad to be included i know what you mean if any of that makes any sense but Vin, if you do remember the Crosby Herald and you've got any particular highlights do let me know

P.S. says Vin, the guy riding the penny farthing looked a complete burk I don't think we can say burk because I think in Cockney rhyming slang that's something rude Oh is it? Yes, Barkley Hunt Oh gosh, okay So yeah, the penny farthing thing Something rude. Oh, is it? Yes. Barkley Hunt. Oh, gosh. Okay.

Woof. I know. So, yeah, the penny farthing thing, it's one of my icks, penny farthings. They make me feel really, really odd inside. They're just wrong on every single level. And when I see some twit, can we say that? I might say something else. Bombing around Regent's Park in a penny farthing.

And there are two gentlemen who kind of dress up in plus fours and have 12 moustaches. What, and go round Regent's Park? Yes, on penny farthings. I just think you're just, you're idiots. Have I mentioned my neighbour who takes his cat for a walk? No. No, OK, I just want to know, does anybody else do that?

Because the guy, I see him quite regularly, he's got a dog who walks in front, just does its own thing, it's not on a lead at all. Impeccably well behaved, so I've got no issue with that myself. But the cat is on a very, very long lead. Cats don't like going for walks. Well, the cat looks cheerful enough to me. God, if I tried to take Barbara and Brian out for a walk,

I don't know, way. Every time I see this guy, I am tempted to just see if Dora would cooperate, but, yeah, I don't think there's much chance. No. No? Okay, fair enough. When do you think the Penny Farthing people realised that they'd created something just really stupid?

They'd created a monster. Because it would just never have worked. You know, the first time that they took a penny farthing out for a road test, it would have gone over just one grate in Victorian London and tragedy would have ensued. Or just one simple cobble in your... I mean, who thought, let's make another one after the prototype? To a good point.

But, of course, there wouldn't have been cars, so there wouldn't be much danger. There wouldn't be many cars. But you'd have such an uneven road. Yeah. You need thick tyres quite low to the ground, don't you? Would the ULEs ever have been required if we'd just stuck with the penny farthing and gone no further?

Well, it wouldn't have been very suitable for the woman cyclist, would it either? Because your skirts would really get caught in all of that. Yeah, that's true. Yeah. And back in the day, of course, ladies didn't wear trousers. My late grandmother never wore trousers. It was a sign of

difficulties. Being a little butch. Yes. Which we wanted to avoid at all costs. Thank God for the war. Right. Best wishes, says Vicky. On the podcast on the 17th of July, you spoke about the fact that TV and film dramas tend to focus on the same old kings and queens, mostly from the overhyped Tudor era.

I'm a history buff and love the Tudors, but I completely agree with your sentiment. Can I suggest that you invite David Mitchell, the peep show one, not the Cloud Atlas novelist one, to talk about his new book, Unruly, a history of England's kings and queens, which is due out. I attended an online session where David read some of this book for the audio version. There was a Q&A section, and I asked him who he considered

to be the most undervalued monarch. And in my excitement at having my question read out, I can't remember whether he said... Oh, righty, come on. Whether he said Henry I or Henry II, but it was one of them. Needless to say, David was extremely insightful and funny, and I'm sure your listeners would enjoy his perspective.

He is a funny guy, actually, and that's a good idea, so we might book him. And that will be our opening question, just to assuage your frustration there, Vicky. Did he say Henry I or Henry II? I can't tell you anything about either of those Henrys. I can't either, unless one was in some way linked to Eleanor of Aquitaine. If I'm watching University Challenge, and it's a long shot,

if you ever just need a name from history to punt out as the potential answer to a question to impress your sofa mates just shout Eleanor of Aquitaine because at least twice a series it's right yeah I think there are some other ones that you can stack up as well

I think probably just shouting proton any science question or at least save yourself from embarrassment yeah and if it's a chemical one, I could just shout, silver! Yeah. Because that's sometimes the answer too. Yes, no, very much so. So Amol Rajan.

Yes. Yes. He was doing the new university challenge, wasn't he? And I think it was on, it wasn't on BBC Amol, his special channel. Now listen, I'm normally the one who has a go at him. Now you got him first. No, I'm not having a go at him. Now you've got him first. No, I'm not having a go at him. I've always really liked him when I've met him, Jane.

But the thing that surprised me about it is it's not really been revamped at all. I thought they might have a set change. Because, you know, all those big shiny floor TV shows, they've got massive sets and they've got the wheel, they've got the chase. You've got, obviously, the weakest link. But they're all huge you know great big something

moves here and a camera swings over there and they've just chosen to stay with exactly the same set. But isn't that the appeal of it it's completely unchanged it's a format borrowed from America isn't it so maybe they're not allowed to change it maybe not so they just

need to, they're forever allowed to change it. Maybe not. So they just need to, they're forever going to channel Bamber Gascon. When you did The Weakest Link, which we can enjoy on the telly, did you say over Christmas? It was September. Did you, because I am a shorter person, but did you have a little,

did you have something to stand on? They gave me a special disc. Did they? Oh, that's nice. No, because I was wondering about that. It was worse than that, because in the lineup there was me and then next to me at the next door podium was rick edwards who does the five live breakfast oh he's very tall so it was like six foot four and so when the camera came

around to do its practice introducing yourself things you could see it going on to me and then it went it had to pause for rick edwards and went and then the director came over and said that's not going to work we're going to have to move you so uh rick edwards was replaced with a wine the drumming weather presenter oh yeah oh yeah well i like him oh he's lovely absolutely lovely really really lovely chap but it was quite funny and then general knowledge like like. Superb. Is it? Yeah, he's a thoroughly entertaining chap as well. But yes, and then even that didn't do the trick.

So they brought along a little kind of, yeah, a little disc. Well, it was quite a lot of a disc, actually, for me to stand on. So I'll look normal height on the telly, but obviously I'm not. And you'll know my secrets. And I felt a little bit vulnerable standing on a disc. I can't really blame that for my performance.

Well, we don't know what your performance actually was at the moment, do we? And you have to remind me, who is the host of The Weakest Link at the moment? Ramesh Ranganathan. Oh gosh, I've forgotten about that. He asked the question, so we don't know how clever he is. No, we don't. Well, he's very clever. He's quite, he's got

an intimidating look about him. Has he? Yeah, I think they have to channel that, don't they? Because that's Anne Robinson's defining moment of bitchy glory that they're trying to continue. Yeah, Anne Robinson grew up in Crosby, of course, as well. Well, she did, and didn't her mother run a chicken stall

in the market? That's right, yeah. Do you think your't her mother run a chicken stall in the market? That's right. Do you think your mum's ever bought a chicken from Anne Robinson's mum? Oh I think she quite possibly had. Were they live chickens? Nan would have done. No. No. I think they'd gone they'd gone had gone to the trouble of killing the chickens. Like the

middle ages. I don't know. I like it. I love the idea of my grandmother in particular manhandling a live chicken home on the L3 boss. Just saying to Anne Robinson's mum, ring its neck. The big one at the back.

Oh dear. Right. So yes, I think we've covered quite a lot of life's rich, I was about to say life's rich tapestry and you know why

I was going to say it? I saw a guy on the Northern Line coming to work today. That's part of the London, the shimmering London Underground public transport network. The Northern Line

isn't the best line I'm here to tell you. It's a little bleak down there. But there was a guy sitting diagonally opposite me who was doing a tapestry.

That's lovely. I know. And he was an incredibly fashionable young man. He reminded me a little bit of Josh Arnold. Hot or not? Well, I would say he was hot. Well, we were all hot down there, actually, today. Because it's 21 Celsius in London today.

And by the way, we're very grateful for it. And he was just, he was sort of completely at ease and utterly immersed in his work. Well, I think that's a very sensible thing to do on the tube. Was it an old-fashioned scene that he was doing? It looked like a floral, it was a sort of bouquet of flowers in a vase. Do you think there's somewhere you can go where you can find really a little bit more up to the minute tapestry what do they call them i want

to call it a salter but it's not that is it you know the the where you've got a print already made out on the the thing that you say the tapestry so it could just be a scene of somebody gawping at their phone well just something a bit bringing to life the 21st century yeah more modern than roses and i'm always thinking there's a there's a lot of floral stuff going on in tapestries i take your point it does make you think will the art galleries of the future just be filled with images of people caught looking at their phones maybe pathetic isn't it we are such a gormless lot when you look around and see people just looking at their phones, which, by the way, is what I'll be doing in 20 minutes' time when I'm on the underground again,

it depresses the life out of me sometimes. Well, why don't you treat yourself to a nice little thimble, thread and a needle, and just start doing some petit pont yourself? Somewhat. I think it's called petit pont, isn't it? The very, very tiny, very, very complicated... With my eyesight, I think the chances of that...

My eyesight and poor motor skills, I don't think that's going to happen. I'd quite like to see the finished article, actually. We've had some really interesting news today, haven't we, about Latitude. This is the music festival down there in Suffolk. And we're going on for Thursday's programme and indeed the podcast. And there's been a bit of an issue about our yurt. I know. So there's been a bit of an issue about transport. And I have to apologise on behalf of the Skoda Monte Carlo

because that was going to be our chosen method of getting there and that's not going to happen. So we've had a lot of meetings and discussions about transport. We sorted that one out. We went fewie. Okay, we all know what time we're meeting, when we're going. We were going to stay in yurts, separate yurts, children, separate yurts. It's not that kind of co-presentation.

And so Jane and I discussed who was bringing sleeping bags a little camping stove we got it all worked out and then news came in at about quarter to five that in fact the yurts have been cancelled and we're in a terraced house all of us well uh i thought it was detached i don't think i think it was described as the nearest oh my god i think i think it was described oh my god i think no jane i think it is semi it may be semi oh semi okay i'm more at ease with that but it's definitely got off street parking right okay gosh yeah but um it's now really really confusing as to who's going to sleep in which bedroom you've got this weird thing going on where if you're in a single bed it's got to be pushed up against a wall so that means you can't go in the twin room and i do not want to share a

twin room with you that's so close to the two ronnie's you've made it very clear no it's more common wise but they actually shared a bed no but the two ronnie's used to do the twin bed thing didn't they yes they had they had a one of their skits was set in bed. But I don't know what's going to happen now. I'm so confused. I don't know what equipment to bring with me. Right. Well, if you know what Fee should bring to a semi-detached house in the South World area, I suspect.

I mean, it looks amply equipped. I love the word ample. It's got a tiled splashback. Well, absolutely. It looks lovely. But we cannot go to the Latitude Festival and find ourselves back at home at 9.30

on a Thursday evening catching up with an episode of Casualty. I can. It slightly takes away the festival vibe. Not for me it doesn't. It sounds absolutely ideal. Hello to, I don't know who this is from, actually. Oh, the En Horn Fleur ladies.

What? Yeah. Hello, Jane and Fee. My friend Anna, Leo, Susie and I are avid listeners of your show. And on a ladies' weekend away to France, this is a yearly trip to France to have a little time away from children and husbands. Why you'd want that, I've no idea. And a lot of chatter, giggles, seafood and champagne. We came across this and it is an

image of a penny farthing on a traffic island surrounded by flowers. Thank you very much indeed for that. This listener who, for whatever reason, doesn't give their name says they are reading uh fresh water for flowers i'm not sure um they say oh naomi hello naomi i'm not sure unusual good to read something different to my normal genre i'm looking forward to the discussion around it well naomi it's coming your way next week so prepare yourself yeah so you've got to finish the book or try and finish the book by thursday and we will uh we will talk about it. And we'd love to hear your thoughts in voice note form, if you fancy, to actually hear yourself on the podcast.

So just record a little voice note, send it as an attachment on email. It can be really short. Yeah, janeandfee at times.radio or send us your thoughts. And if you fancy to just make them a little bit different so you don't have to give us a kind of normal resume of what you liked about the book or what you didn't like about the book. I think what I'd quite like to do

is just pick out a couple of passages that I thought were so lovely and surprising. That would be my contribution to our discussion. But I'm interested in hearing. I think it's one of those books that will stay with me for quite a long time actually, I know that you haven't really enjoyed it so hopefully it won't stay with you for very long

It's been staying by my bed for quite some time Can you describe the picture you've got in front of you because it is brilliant and we will take a photograph put it up on the Insta It's actually brilliant but slightly It's disturbing I wonder why it is disturbing

It's from Clara who's in Brittany. Last weekend I was at a flea market near where I live and I spotted crates of reject Barbies and action men. I felt sorry for them and so I took a snap, which I've attached here. Feel free to share on your Instagram page

if you want to. And I think we will, Clara, for the reason that Fi said, because I don't know what it is about this. Somebody with better powers of description can tell us why it creeps you out. Is it the naked dollies? What is it? Well, I think it's the fact that they're all just kind of piled up as... There's not an awful lot of dignity and respect,

certainly, on the Barbie side, is there? Well, nor on the action chap side either I have to say not every one of the figures in the male bucket of discarded toys is an action man there are a couple of sort of monster type figures and I think that's the is that the Hulk? He hasn't got any pants on

rather let himself down there. That might be a different type of Hulk. I don't know. I haven't looked too closely at the men. But yes, it is very odd. It is very odd indeed. Why is it so troubling?

I don't know. We'll put it up as soon as we've finished doing this. Can I just read you an email that made me laugh, even though it's been sent in a very serious way? Hang on. Hello, I'm Mirabelle from Tohoku Kishina Film Corporation, manager for content acquisition, the top one streaming platform in Japan.

Oh, yeah. We wish to make an inquiry for a possible partnership deal. Oh, God. We have a project at hand, being our third project for the year, titled The Tenth Generation, and we'd like to make partnership proposal to make this project a success and we really wish to have a long time business

relationship. We'd like to share with you more details of the content and benefits of this proposal and how it can generate much profit if you can agree to our terms. Well, I mean, I don't I very much doubt we'll be able to agree to them. Is the single bed up against the wall, Mirabelle?

Kindly check out the attached content details and links for trailer. Your sincere feedback will be highly appreciated. See if we can execute a deal as soon as possible. Await your feedback with thanks. Thank you. I think that's our big break, but it's slightly hard to interpret. It certainly is. Being our third project for the year, titled The Tenth Generation. What they've done there is, you know, it's on a template

and it had title, you know, put the title in there, but they've left the word title in. Oh, that doesn't suggest professionalism, does it? I don't think we want to work with them. I don't think we do. And anyway, you're absolutely right. Nobody would be able to make us agree to their terms. What kind of women do you think we want to work with them. I don't think we do. And anyway, you're absolutely right. Nobody would be able to make us agree to their terms. What kind of women do you think we are?

Do you want to introduce our big guest? Because I really enjoyed this interview and I think everybody else will too. Very much so. So Katrina O'Sullivan is a really respected lecturer and academic. And she got her first degree. She got several degrees, I think, from Trinity University. That in itself... Trinity College. From Trinity College. And that in itself wouldn't really mark her out as being remarkable. But when

you know her journey, it really is remarkable. She's written a memoir called Poor, which is full of insight into a life lived right up against the boundaries placed on it by poverty. It's also a book that we both thought was really full of self-awareness and observation. One of the things that she wrote is this. It's easier to go with the flow. If you've lived in stress and disharmony all your life, that's the current you tend to go with, even if it will end up with you in deeper water. And in her case, the current was very strong because she was the middle of five kids. Her parents were both addicts. And we first

meet her in the book when her father is lying in his pants on a filthy bed, having overdosed, injecting himself with drugs. And it's the tiny figure of Katrina who goes on to tell us the story of a childhood that was dominated by addiction and poverty. We meet her now as this incredible woman. I've really enjoyed her company, Jane. I thought she was a really, really fantastic presence. And I tell you what, if I were a student who could be lectured by her, I would feel beyond privileged, I really would.

Because that's proper insight, proper life experience. And she says some uncomfortable things in that book, which we did slightly, if I'm honest, stuff about those sort of middle class signs, what middle class people wear, what they, you know, it really, yeah, it really made me think and I really do recommend the book. So we started by asking her what kind of reaction she'd had to the book. It's actually been really cathartic to have shared my story with the world or with the people who've read it. I was asked to write by Penguin over a year and a half ago after a newspaper story in Ireland and it really took me a long time to decide whether I

would do it or not because of obviously the vulnerability that goes with sharing the deep stories that I've shared but I really feel like I'm really privileged to have survived poverty and to be able to thrive in academia but also in my life and I kind of feel a little bit like I have a responsibility I suppose in some ways to share my story not only to maybe empower other girls like me who've been through hardship but also maybe to inform those people who are a little bit privileged in the world who don't really understand poverty so it's been an amazing experience so far it's been really positive. We'll come to all of those things because your observations are really brilliant and really thoughtful and so worth hearing. Can you tell us a little bit about that start in life, though, and particularly about your dad?

Because actually his start in life had not been terrific, his first five years in particular. Yeah, so in Ireland, we, you know, we've a terrible history with the Catholic Church, unfortunately. And my dad was adopted at age five from one of the orphanages that's quite renowned for abuse. We don't know what happened to my dad in the first five years of his life. He never talked about it. And so, but we can assume with the way his life turned out that he suffered a lot within that period and it's a really critical period of everybody's life and my dad turned out to be a drug addict despite the fact that he was adopted into a lovely family my grandparents were middle class they lived in a lovely suburb leafy suburb that's what they call it. But my dad, I think his destiny was set by the hardship that he experienced in the start in his life. So my dad left Ireland at 18 and moved to the middle of England and he started on a journey of chaos and visits to prison

and heroin addiction was what dominated the majority of his life. He did have this one memory though, didn't he, of being in a cot and being in a fire? Yeah, but I don't know how true that was. So my dad lied. You know, it's in the book, but he was a liar. So he was a really vivacious character, actually. I get some of my good positive traits from him. He was very outgoing and he could hold a room and tell a tale, a tall tale. And so he did tell this story of a fire. But I don't know if it was true.

And unfortunately, my dad died when he was 56 from his addiction. So I don't know. I could never really check. But he did tell us this story. And I think actually, whether it was real or not, it demonstrated the feelings he had about his childhood and what he felt happened to him before he was adopted my dad also told me stories of you know he used to wag school and he was really intelligent and lie out in the on the beachfront in in Dublin and just spend his days

smoking weed which is not the great a great thing to do, and reading books. And so my dad had these characteristics that were really lovable and likeable, but also when you're the child of that, it's not easy. So the fire story, I don't know if it's true, but I imagine it was his way of telling us that there was pain at the start. So obviously, if both of your parents have addictions, there's something that they are permanently thinking about before they're ever thinking about you.

And some of the stories that you tell us, the reader in the book, I mean, they are, they're so heartbreaking. You used to be asked to go to the shops to buy Milky Bars, not because they were the sweetest, most wonderful chocolate bars on the block, but because your parents wanted the foil. Yeah, I remember discovering that actually. So it was such a letdown. It was so painful because they used to send us up the shop

with 5p or 10p or whatever it was back then in the 80s. And I could only buy certain sweets and I didn't know why, but I remember actually witnessing them taking the foil they're obviously embarrassed they didn't want to buy tin foil in the shop so this is their way of of hiding their their drug use and I remember seeing my mom take the take the foil and burn the heroin and I was so disappointed because even the smallest piece of joy which was the chocolate bar was tainted by their addiction. The important thing, though, one of the reasons I wrote my story was actually, you know, lots of people are in addiction are good

people. So like, I wrote the book because I wanted to actually talk about my parents in the whole of who they were, because they were great people, as well as being addicted they weren't just a needle in the groin they were vivacious and hopeful and funny and there was all these other wonderful things about them but unfortunately they were both mentally unwell and addiction dominated their lives and ours and what it meant as well for you was that when you went outside of your family home there was judgment attached wasn there? And when you went to school, although you loved school, didn't you? And it was a safe place to be. I mean, there was a fair amount of nastiness and bullying and picking on you through just no fault of your own. Yeah, this is one of the sad things about, you know, kids who are living in poverty. Like I wet the bed because I was obviously really afraid and kids who are living in poverty. Like I wet the bed because I was obviously really afraid and kids

who are living in trauma, they do wet the bed. And we didn't have towels, we didn't get washed, we didn't have toothbrushes. And so I used to roll out of bed, run to school, happy, happy as Larry because there was books there and there was this warm teacher. But I smiled and I had knits and kids didn't want to play with me because when you're the smiley kids you're unpopular so I had this horrible experience going on at home which was really fearful and I didn't know what was and there was no food I didn't know what was coming and then I go to school and face rejection as well from my peers which was really difficult I do feel really lucky though as well from my peers, which was really difficult. I do feel really lucky,

though, as well, because I had this wonderful teacher, Miss Arkinson, in the first year of my schooling. So while the kids weren't playing with me, this wonderful woman actually took me under her wing. I think she might have took everybody under their wing, but she was one of them teachers that make everybody feel like they're special. And she kind of intervened. I remember like she fed me basically, like we'd go into school and I'd go in and she'd have breakfast for me before everybody came in. So there was really negative experiences,

but there was also these chinks of light that were shone on me throughout my childhood that I really think made a massive difference to me ending up where I am today. You talk about yourself as a child being filled with hope and actually just you know only knowing you through the book it is the feeling that I was left with as a reader of just absolute amazement at actually how much that hope sustained you and also just how it how you managed to kind of hang on to it really

I had hope all the way through my childhood I think I read a lot so I lived in stories and them stories really helped me and also like I said I had a few teachers who were really pivotal in my life during my education, my early years. So I just always had this view that it was going to get better. And whether that was because Roald Dahl told me that some giant was going to come and pick me out of my bed one night or a trunchbull, I don't know what it was. But I definitely was a very hopeful girl. I think lots of kids are, though. We're all born.

We might have different personalities, you know, introvert, extrovert, but we're all hopeful. And unfortunately, I just had a lot of stuff pile on me. And I actually remember the point where the hope went. I think that was the worst part of my life was when I got pregnant at 15. And my parents kicked me out. And it was like, the hope was gone. And that was a really dark space because previous to that, despite what was going on, I did have this place inside me that I could return to where I was thinking,

whether it was magical thinking or not, things are going to get better. But once I was homeless and living in a hostel, giving birth to my child at 16 alone, I was really lost then. And I felt like there was never going to be any way out of this. And now you have three children, correct, and are married. And we'll come on to the love story, which is actually amazing, a little bit later.

But what would your older mum self now say to that young 15-year-old girl? Because you were so certain that you were going to keep your son. Yeah, it's funny because, I don't know, it was meant to be, obviously, because I'd never considered not keeping John. I think I would tell her, you know, you're going to be OK, I'm here for you. You know, I would definitely try to encourage her

to just hold on and reassure her that she's not alone. I think the aloneness was the worst bit and having the responsibility of a child when I knew I didn't have the capabilities to look after him or what to even expect and then to have nobody around me was really terrifying. But I tell her that I have her back as I say in my who I dedicate my book to I dedicated to that little girl like I have you and I'd probably say that to her now and I'd say look it's going to get better in ways that you're never going to imagine and you can't dream of your life's going to be turn out amazingly what is being on the beam because you mentioned that quite a few times. I've never heard that expression before.

If you imagine that there's a, I like to envision it as there's a light that we all have inside of us. And sometimes things can dampen that light down. But if you're actually in your spirit, doing exactly what you're meant to be doing, living the right way, you're just shining. And you're just on the beam. You're just free and on the beam. And a good friend of mine, a woman I met in Dublin, actually taught me to try and make sure that most days I was living the right way, which means being on the beam, on the sunbeam, on the beam of light. VoiceOver describes what's happening on your iPhone screen. VoiceOver on. Settings.

So you can navigate it just by screen. Voice over on settings. So you can navigate it just by listening. Books, contacts, calendar, double tap to open. Breakfast with Anna from 10 to 11. And get on with your day. Accessibility. There's more to iPhone. we are talking to the author of the memoir poor katrina o'sullivan and she told us that poor had been number one in the bestsellers in ireland for eight weeks well it was number two last week but that was four books yeah eight weeks yeah it's number one well a cracking performance by a book

that i think is so important can we just actually catch up with when you left the UK and when you went to Ireland and the difference between the two? And I think what you make clear in this book is that there is a class system in Ireland. I mean, they might try to tell you there isn't, but that's just baloney. Yeah, it's the same, actually. The class is, well, when you're living in poverty, it's exactly the same. The services are not there for you. Your education prospects and your employment prospects are limited. It's exactly the same. I just think in Ireland, they like to deny it a little bit more because there's a royal family here.

So it's much more obvious. But when you say to an Irish person, go and live in Ballymun versus Ballsbridge, they'll say no because that's where all the poor people are corralled together and there's a lot of poverty. So class exists in every culture. It's just sometimes it's more hidden now you have siblings and their trajectory has not been yeah the same as yours i mean you now you went to trinity college i mean we'll catch up with exactly how you got there in a moment or two you are an academic what has happened to them well so i it's my story not their story so I think it's important

that they get to tell their stories so some of them have ended up in the same way that my parents have ended up and then some of them are successful as well but in their own right so um it's important for me to kind of speak about me rather than them because I I do feel protective of them and in the book I try my best to keep the story to me. But they have difficulties. And poverty affects you in loads of different ways. And all of us have had to try to recover from the dark experience that we had,

both in my home, but also in education and the limits that poverty puts on you from a societal point of view. Yeah, no, you're absolutely right to make that point that this is your story. And of course, we should say as well, if only it was all tied up with pretty bows at the end, but nobody's life is like that. And although you did come across two brilliant teachers,

there was Mr. Pickering as well, wasn't there, a bit later in your life. There was also, there were some horrible people who were as wicked to you as some of your fellow pupils. Yeah, so Miss Cowles is what we call her in the book i'd love to say a real name i'm not going to but um yeah she she took a really a real dislike to me and unfortunately in education we have inconsistencies in terms of how teachers treat children and this particular teacher like a few others was extremely mean to me. So she used to shout at me because I didn't have my pencils with me. And I hadn't eaten, you know, and she knew that because they all knew. And what's hard for me, actually, having returned to my story and met some of my teachers, is actually most of the people in the staff room knew what she was doing to me and other

children like me but nobody really intervened and I think that's really important to say is that from my point of view if you're not doing something about inequality then you're actually complicit with it and it was very hard for me to realize that some of the other teachers who I really cared about me and did good things for me they actually knew that this teacher was mistreating students and so that was really hard and what was really tough is that she robbed books from me in some cases so she used to make me read out loud and then berate me for making mistakes and I always thought I was a good reader because there's you really need to be good at stuff when you've got bad stuff going on and I was good at reading

and I was good at sport and this particular teacher used to stand me up and make me read and then say it was a mistake and tell me I'd done wrong and that was really hard really really difficult you are now at Trinity College Dublin which is the academic institution that anybody in Europe could name so how how have you ended up there in the nicest possible way Katrina in the shortest possible way oh you know what actually I didn't know I didn't know I was clever so I failed in school like a lot of poor kids do you shone at certain subjects I shone until teenage years and then teenage years come along and all the hormones and the craziness and everybody's mad in my life and my community and so I was brilliant at English brilliant at some subjects and then life takes over and I was

a bad kid in school so I was naughty girl I'd be around the back of the bike sheds with the lads rather than in class and a lot of teachers didn't see past that and so the expectation for me was just to finish school if that get your GCSEs and get out here. And so I internalized that. And I just thought I was, I wasn't that clever. And I never knew anyone who went to university, especially an elite university, nobody went to Oxford or Cambridge in my community. And when I moved to Dublin, I was living with my parents. They have a foundation years over there, like they do here, but they're specifically targeted for people who are in poverty or didn't get an opportunity and I by chance met had a good friend and she was like me poor too had a kid she was on her own and she stood on O'Connell Street one day and she said

I'm studying law at Trinity College all proud of herself and I was like if she can do that I can and it was it was like a light went on obviously coming up to that I'd been engaging in therapy I'd done an adult ed course there'd been some services and structures in place in Ireland at the time that were funding poverty and I was ready and one thing I think people forget is like girls like me are really skilled like I'm brave I'm mouthy I know how to advocate for myself so I marched over to Trinity and knocked on this woman's door. And I was like, Karen's gone here. And I think I want to go here, like full of chat.

But this lovely woman sat me down and said, you're amazing. And I don't think I'd had someone tell me that in a long time. And so I found myself applying to the foundation year. And then everything changed because I discovered something about myself that I never knew. That I'm really clever, I'm really talented, I can do loads of great stuff intellectually. I still had all the other troubles going on, being a lone parent and struggling in relationships,

but I learned that I was good academically and that just propelled me forward. Katrina O'Sullivan, and we'd highly recommend her memoir, Poor. And I think you're really right, Jane, to highlight what it tells you as a reader who didn't have anything like that experience of childhood, just about how you may think that you're showing kindness and empathy towards somebody who's had a real struggle to get through.

But actually, the way it's being received, it's not particularly great. And I was grateful to her for being really honest about stuff like that, because it does make you rejig how you are. And by saying you, I mean people like you and me. Well, yeah, I mean, actually, there is a standout moment in the book where she is mistaken for a cleaner at Trinity where she was about to give a lecture. Because a student, perhaps a bit like us, sees this woman putting out chairs and she's dressed in a particular way. She looks a certain way.

a certain way and this individual makes an assumption that this lady needs to get out because she's going to get in the way of the woman who's giving the lecture but she is giving the lecture it just made me squirm i have to say and that really happened yeah and it's oh it's awful but i think also um what i really really loved about the book was her sense of hope as a child because she doesn't spare the horses in describing, you know, some elements of living with two addicts. You know, it's incredibly problematic. And the house wasn't clean, you know, and she didn't have, you know, extra sheets. She didn't have a toothbrush. Yep, to, you know, change the bed and, you know, all of that stuff.

And just her spirit is so strong, isn't it? As a child, as a teenager, she gets pregnant at 15. I just thought it was really, really good to meet her. I thought she was a great woman. But as she says in the conversation, it's just not been plain sailing. And I suspect it probably won't be because it just can't be based on what she's seen, what she's been through and what's still there in her life

and indeed in the lives of her siblings as well. So I just wish her the best of luck and I really hope that because she's now appeared on Times Radio and I know on lots of other media outlets, lots of people in Britain read it too because she did spend the early part of her life in the Midlands here and only went to Ireland sort of when she was, what was it, she was 16, wasn't she?

Yeah. And she is now a respected Irish academic and I very much hope she goes on to write more as well. I'm sure she will. That was Katrina O'Sullivan. And the book is called Poor. We love hearing from you all. If you want to get in touch,

our email is janeandfiatimes.radio. We have got, who's on the programme tomorrow? Well, we're talking about what makes leaders with Ferdinand Mount. We are. We're talking about Little Caesars and Big Caesars. That's his latest book. And Caesar salad. Which, by the way, is something I've never liked. I think it's a pointless salad.

I don't really understand what's in a Caesar salad well it's very very highly cheesed it's highly cheesed and it's highly anchovied I like an anchovied but I would never put a cheese and an anchovied together in my mouth that's a bombshell

and I will leave you with it I think have a good evening chew on that kids goodnight evening. Chew on that, kids. Good night. We're bringing the shutters down on another episode of the internationally acclaimed podcast Off Air with Jane Garvey and Fee Glover. Our Times Radio producer is Rosie Cutler and the podcast executive producer is Henry Tribe. But don't forget that you can get another two hours of us every Monday to Thursday afternoon here on Times Radio. We start at 3 p.m. and you can listen for free on your smart speaker. Just shout Play Times Radio at it.

You can also get us on DAB Radio in the car or on the Times Radio app whilst you're out and about being extremely busy. And you can follow all our tosh behind the mic and elsewhere on our Instagram account. Just go onto Insta and search for Jane and Fee and give us a follow. So in other words, we're everywhere, aren't we, Jane? Pretty much everywhere. Thank you for joining us. And we hope you can join us again on Off Air very soon.

VoiceOver describes what's happening on your iPhone screen. VoiceOver on. Settings. So you can navigate it just by listening. Books. Contacts. Calendar. Double tap to open. Breakfast with Anna from 10 to 11. And get on with your day. Accessibility. There's more to iPhone.