How Does It Feel Part 4 - Writing Political Fiction

Socialist Party recruitment drive, Anti-War demo, 2001

If I’ve learned anything from following the British media in the past month, it’s that comedians spend a lot of time thinking about politics. Oh, and they want you to know about it. If Karl Marx could stop spinning in his Highgate Cemetery grave for long enough, he would probably evaluate the current situation thus: ‘in a land where politicians have become jokers, then jokers will become politicians’. But the enthusiastically polarised reaction to Russell Brand’s thoughtie-woughties suggests that the public is looking beyond traditional sources for political analysis.

My own introduction to politics came through the underground punk scene in the late 90s. There was a culture of DIY and co-operation, and many of the bands, fanzines and labels were happy to talk about politics as much as music – mainly a mixture of animal rights, anti-fascism, class war and, to a lesser extent, feminism. The level of analysis wasn’t always that great, but there was a sense of passionate activism; the commitment needed to maintain this sort of community (organising gigs, printing fanzines, maintaining huge lists of contacts) is ideal for fuelling campaigns, and most people were happy to give up time to support causes. In terms of fiction, the first book I remember as a big influence was The Ragged-Trousered Philanthropists; Robert Tressell’s ability to explain socialist principles in understandable terms makes it a great education.

Now, in a time of low turn-outs and increasing disillusionment with mainstream politics, what role can literature play in the current debates around austerity, climate change and the future? Does anyone listen to writers at all? I spoke to four authors, all of whom engage with politics in their work, for their thoughts. Gregory Norminton is the editor of Beacons, an anthology of short stories tackling climate issues, published to contribute to the Stop Climate Chaos movement. James Miller contributed to Beacons, and has a long-standing involvement with politics in his work, including his 2010 climate change novel Sunshine State. As well as her novel The Quiddity of Will Self, Sam Mills has written young adult books dealing with the war on terror, and is currently working on a novel for adults set around the London riots and the banking crisis. Kerry Hudson’s debut novel Tony Hogan Bought Me An Ice-Cream Float Before He Stole My Ma looked at a young working class girl’s experience of growing up under Thatcherism.

Gregory Norminton’s experience of putting together the Beacons anthology is illustrative of some of the issues authors face when engaging with explicitly political themes. He explained why it was especially appropriate to take a literary approach to the issue, saying ‘I began this project six years ago, when only science fiction writers seemed to be sinking their teeth into the enormity of the ecological crisis. I felt then that literary fiction was asleep, in much the same way as civil society was asleep, even as the gale whipped around it. We have the tools, technologically, to avoid the worst, but the political will is lacking. Myopia, strategic blindness and quite possibly the wiring of our brains means we cannot recognise the dislocations heading our way. Quite simply, the climate crisis is the result of a catastrophic failure of the imagination. The collective stories of our culture – of perpetual growth and materialism and self-gratification – are so many zombie lies devouring our brains. Let those of us who imagine for a living come up with alternative stories that tell the painful, humbling and salvific truth: that we are mortal, transient beings on a planet whose destruction we cannot survive.’

However, many authors were put off the idea of directly tackling climate change in their work: ‘The dangers of polemic, of soapbox writing, inhibited them. We have not yet invented stories, or even idioms, commensurate with the new reality… to put it simply, the scale of the ecological crisis seems too large for a narrative form rooted in the psychology of individuals and small groups.’ Whether the project was a success in traditional terms may be up for debate; as Norminton acknowledges ‘the cruel truth is that the influence of literary fiction on our culture is negligible’. He argues, though, that ‘artistically, Beacons has helped to challenge writers to engage with a subject that belongs in their work, given that its effects and consequences surround us.’

The danger of lapsing into polemic is a risk which most writers are aware of. As Sam Mills explains, ‘the creative process isn’t as simple as sitting down and writing a novel with black and white political ideas. For example, I have campaigned actively against GM crops, but I have no wish to write a novel about GM, as my views are so black and white that I fear my characters would end up being caricatures and stereotypes. A novel requires ambiguity and complexity because first and foremost the writer explores human nature, and therefore any attempt to write a political novel requires a certain amount of detachment, an ability to step back from the subject. You don’t have to look at a writer’s political ideas before you read them, because their novel, if it’s good, should do something more profound than simply exist as a vehicle for the author’s views – it may even contain ideas that surprise the author!’

This is a view supported by James Miller: ‘I’m a great believer that the author is ‘dead’, even if they are still alive! We should never think that an author’s political views hold the key or the meaning to their work. Writers are, after all, contradictory liars at best. Unlike politicians, we don’t have to be consistent and our personal politics, or indeed, the conduct of our lives, don’t necessarily have to have a bearing on what we write about and certainly have nothing to do with the quality of our writing – many very fine and interesting writers have held loathsome political opinions or been very ‘bad’ people. Of course, all texts are an amalgam of various competing and often contradictory ideologies and can be read in any way – so even if a writer professes themselves to be very left wing their work will contain all sorts of reactionary or right wing traces or tendencies.’

Movement Against the Monarchy demo, 2000

 It is natural for some of the writer’s own views to infuse their writing. Kerry Hudson draws a distinction between the acts of writing and interpreting: ‘As a writer I think a work should stand for itself. As a reader I think you can usually interpret the writer's politics from their novel. Most novels are imbued with conflict, reactions and subsequent choices and what the characters do is usually fairly indicative of the political stand-point they were written from.’ It is important though, that the characters don’t become lost in political point-scoring: ‘I knew I was writing a book that would expose a part of society that didn't often get to take centre stage in novels, and I was reflecting sixteen years of British society so there was an inescapable political element to the book but I never wanted that to be the heart of my story. The story is about those women and their lives, the estates, that particular type of childhood. All I wanted do was reflect my own experiences authentically and let people make their own choices about whether the Ryans' lot, the treatment they receive in various institutions and the poverty they experience was acceptable and reflective of a truly developed society. But then, I am a political person and had worked in the charity sector for years before embarking on the novel so it's impossible that can't somehow be found on those pages.’

For Gregory Norminton, while fiction will often reflect the conditions of society, the author can still leave their own views at the door: ‘My instinctive response, as a writer of fiction, is simple: if the reader knows the author’s political views, the author isn’t working hard enough. This is because good fiction honours and reflects the complexity of human life: it trades in ambiguity, and in so doing resists the urge of party politics to reduce everything to competing opposites. Having said this, literature that bears witness to the society in which it exists cannot fail to have a political dimension, as politics, in the 
broadest sense of the term, shapes the conditions in which we (and our fictional characters) live.’

More than ever, there is an expectation that writers will maintain a public persona, making themselves available to readers through social media, blog tours and personal appearances. If writers are wary of campaigning in their literature, do sites such as Twitter offer a new platform for them to discuss their political views? Gregory Norminton is an enthusiastic tweeter (‘mostly to aphorise and complain about things’), but recognises the potential drawbacks of social media for writers: ‘It can be a great campaigning tool, but it can also sap the mind and spirit of the peace and stillness from which durable writing comes’.
 

There is also the danger of being misinterpreted, as Kerry Hudson explains: ‘I think, and this doesn't just go for political dialogue but any, it's a difficult wee game to put yourself in the public forum when that self is not you but an online version of you. It does definitely make it easier to engage with writers and readers on political issues but the danger is you'll say something you regret or were misinformed about, like we all do in real life, and that becomes part of people's perception of you. I'm very careful to only talk on sites like Twitter. about things I've either personal experience of (either from my upbringing or work in the charity sector) or to point people towards people more qualified and articulate than myself when it's something I care about but which I don't feel fully knowledgeable about.’ According to James Miller, while authors are encouraged to tweet, publishers also warn them off discussing certain topics for fear of causing a backlash: ‘I know some writers who have been specifically told by their publishers (usually their US publisher) never to tweet or post anything about politics or say anything controversial at all in case it alienates their audience - these tend to be quite ‘mainstream’ authors.’

Miller isn’t particularly worried about losing followers by discussing his political views (‘I think it’s pretty obvious to anyone who knows anything about my work that I’m politically engaged and fairly provocative’), but does see tweeting as a poor substitute for action: ‘I’m not sure if simply tweeting a link to something really counts as a political act. I’ve given readings in overtly political contexts – at the UCL student occupation, for example, at the Occupy Bank of Ideas and the Tottenham/ Palestinian literary festival – and I think this is a better way that an author can show their support for a cause. But then again, all artists are radical individualists and, as I said earlier, we’re all thieves and liars – I’d never be that trustful of an author’s politics – are they really supporting a cause or just looking for new material?’

Ultimately, for Sam Mills, social media can never replace fiction as a means of expression. She argues ‘I don’t think authors do have a bigger platform now. Twitter might allow you to link to political articles, but you don’t have sufficient space to develop intelligent arguments. I often find that if I tweet in a neutral way I gain followers, but if I tweet about politics I lose them. Twitter is the social network equivalent of a Rubik’s Cube – you start tweeting in one way, and line all your colours up on that side, and then the other sides all go out of synch. Political arguments need paragraphs, not soundbites – there can’t be a bigger platform than a novel.’

Over the past year, it seems like fiction is catching up with the idea of climate change. Of course, there have always been writers who have engaged strongly with environmental themes (think of Margaret Atwood’s Year of the Flood, or Ballard’s The Drowned World), but 2013 has seen a series of books set in the aftermath of devastating ecological events, including novels by Jess Richards, James Smythe and Christopher Priest. Gregory Norminton offers an explanation for this: ‘Dystopias are infinitely attractive places for writers of fiction: the primal elements of conflict, threat and flight offer rich narrative material. I read and enjoy speculative fiction, and could list a number of exemplary novels that imagine the consequences of biosphere collapse, but is it not time that fiction outside the genre rose to the challenge? SF can be sublime in the Romantic sense: danger viewed from a place of safety. But climate change and resource depletion are not hypothetical scenarios: we are living them already. So yes, environmental dystopia, or Cli-Fi as some journalists are starting to call it, is fertile ground for imaginative writers. I want to read fiction that goes deeper into the roots of our self-deception, our spiritual malaise: fiction that is not in love with the ruins but tries to envisage what will grow in the wasteland.’

James Miller cautions against the view that some political topics are inherently suited to the novel though: ‘I actually don’t think writers are particularly drawn to these issues – and I don’t think the general reader wants to engage with them. Authors and readers (like wider society) would rather stick their heads in the sand and read about knights in armour or middle class dilemmas than face up to the acute crisis that is looming all around us. One agent told me that the book I’m writing at the moment would be hard to sell abroad as “people are fed up of reading about the crisis, they just want escapism”.’ This is a narrative problem as much as a question of taste: ’The story of the environment is a different sort of narrative, one the novel, with its focus on individual agency and individual consciousness, is perhaps not best suited to explore. A lot of political issues require collective solutions but it’s very difficult to write a novel about collective experience. In the book I’m writing at the moment I originally wanted to show how a radical group might act collectively (rather like ‘Occupy’) – but this proved impossible – and in the end I focused on charismatic individuals (and ended up presenting the group in a very negative light even though, on a personal level, I’m very sympathetic and supportive of these sorts of groups).’

Kerry Hudson points to a number of female authors currently writing successfully about poverty and struggle: ‘In my debut year alone there was Jenni Fagan and Lisa O'Donnell, both writing stories that strongly reflect British society and poverty. That year Katherine Boo won the Pulitzer for Behind the Beautiful Forevers (I know it is non-fiction but I think this still proves my point in terms of quality female political writing) and this year NoViolet Bulawayo was shortlisted for the Man Booker for her first novel, We Need New Names, which is an incredibly political book.’ She challenges perceptions of women as predominantly ‘domestic’ writers (‘some are, some aren't, just like their male counterparts’), whilst arguing that ‘actually a domestic setting is often one in which it is most possible to accessibly explore a society’s successes and failures. Tony Hogan could be considered a very 'domestic' book but, as we've said, is still a political reflection of 80's and 90's Britain.’

The Independent reports Thatcher's resignation. Purchased, in frame, from Stoke-on-Trent charity shop

Like Kerry Hudson, the other authors I spoke to were happy to acknowledge the political elements of their work, even if it is not necessarily the defining characteristic. Sam Mills talks about the influence of Orlando Figes’s novel Natasha’s Dance, which spoke of Stalin’s desire to ‘control the artists and musicians of the Soviet Union, but also to earn their respect, because he knew how dangerous art could be. So he wanted to use art for the purposes of propaganda.’

Inspired by this, she has at times used her novels to confront the actions of successive governments, whilst not defining herself solely as a political author: ‘I have written books that overtly tackle political themes, like my YA novel The Boys Who Saved the World, a satire on the War on Terror, and others that have had nothing to do with politics whatsoever, like Quiddity... I tackle political ideas only when something makes me feel angry, and even then, it is often personal. For example, my current novel in progress is about capitalism and Marxism, the riots and the banking crisis, and the ever widening gap between the poor and the wealthy. All of these are topical issues which are of interest to all of us, but I have also been influenced by the fact that my parents were on benefits when I grew up. I hate the present government’s attitude towards the welfare state and their attitude to the poor. My Dad initially had a good job and then, when he was 36 and I was 3, he had a breakdown and developed schizophrenia, so we had to survive on very little for a number of years as we relied on disability benefits. In our current society, however, he would probably have been labelled a workshy scrounger for being too unwell to cope with work and his mental illness would have been regarded as a wilful avoidance of gainful employment. So one of the themes I look at in the book is class, and what it is to live on the breadline, as my family did, or what it might be like to be so wealthy that you can splash out on a dessert that costs $25,000 (I didn’t make this up – I found it online. It is the price of a melting hot chocolate with a gold spoon in the bottom).’

Likewise, Gregory Norminton feels a responsibility to speak out, without wanting his politics to become the defining feature of his work: ‘I am politically engaged as a citizen, and there is a lack of wholeness in writing which tries to seal itself hermetically from the political life of its author. How can I, with my very small voice in the very small discourse of modern letters, keep silent on what preoccupies me? Party politics, on the other hand, is grossly debasing. Writers have a duty to work beyond it.’ He looked beyond the obvious to find a satisfactory way of expressing himself through fiction: ‘it is telling that works which have enabled me to connect my longing for the natural world, and my concerns about its future, with my writing practice, have been either poetry or non-fiction. I would cite Frederick Turner, Richard Mabey, Jay Griffiths, Alice Oswald, John Clare, Ted Hughes. No novel sits on a pedestal in my imagination as that which turned me into the glum eco-worrier I am today.’

James Miller is also uncertain of the potential impact of novels to change people’s minds, but argues instead that they can help us to probe the psychological and moral grey areas which exist behind political issues: ‘I’m interested in exploring the perspective of people who have actual power – what are their motivations, and their reasons, where do they come from and why do they feel and act the way they do? And, most importantly of all, what are their contradictions? For example, in the novel I’m currently writing I have a character who works in banking, but gets drawn to the violence of street protest. Then we find out his father is a Marxist academic… and then that he is, in fact, adopted. Then (I hope) we begin to understand why he thinks and feels and acts the way he does. But ultimately I’m not expecting to really change anybody’s mind. The best we can hope for is to provoke people and make them think a little more and be a little more conscious of the world.’

Asked if he sees himself as a political author, Miller takes inspiration from Orwell: ‘I identify with his view of himself as a writer, saying that he was motivated to write out of both a sense of injustice as well as a desire to create beautiful sentences. I feel the same way. On the one hand I do want to produce aesthetically complex and satisfying ‘art’ but on the other I am acutely aware of all the gross injustice in the world and I feel it would be dishonest not to make some attempt to address it. Furthermore, as fiction is quite different from the pragmatics of actual political solutions, journalistic reportage or opinion it has a sort of critical-utopian function and writers should embrace this aspect of the ‘what if’ to explore alternative possibilities in a way that policy makers or journalists simply cannot do – because fiction presents us with situations rather than having to offer solutions.’

This is the challenge of political writing then: for authors to explore themes they feel passionately about without reverting to polemic; to engage with readers, either by offering relatable situations or by speculating, to investigate alternative possibilities; to challenge the motivations of activists and authoritarians alike (to look behind the mask and locate ‘the insanity inside the bureaucrat’, to borrow a phrase from Maoism). In some cases the dividing line between writer and revolutionary can be a thin one; Orwell fought for the Republican side in Spain, whilst Subcomandante Insurgente Marcos of the EZLN in Mexico has published crime novels alongside collections of his political writings. These are exceptions, but it is still true that literature can be a powerful tool for promoting wider understanding of controversial issues. There are certainly plenty of topics for authors to explore. This article has largely focussed on environmental writing, but another theme emerging in 2013 has been the growing engagement of writers with issues connected to globalisation – Granta 123, for example, showcased the increasingly global perspective of authors writing in English. And whilst the gestation period of novels means we cannot expect instant results, surely the age of austerity will begin to produce its own classics before long.

When I asked people on twitter which books had influenced their political views, responses ranged from biographies of Michael Foot to Roald Dahl’s Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Let me know in the comments below which novels have had an effect on you.