William Woodard "Will" Self (born 26 September 1961) is an English novelist, reviewer and columnist. He is known for his satirical, grotesque and fantastical novels and short stories.
Self was raised, in his words, in "an effortlessly dull" North London suburb (Hampstead Garden Suburb) by"intellectually snobbish parents". Self's father, Peter Self, was both a Professor of Public Administration at the London School of Economics and Professor of Urban Research at the Australian National University, and his mother was a Jewish-American émigré. Despite the intellectual encouragement given by his parents, Self was an emotionally confused and self-destructive child, harming himself with cigarette ends and knives before getting into drugs in his teenage years.
As mentioned on an episode of Have I Got News For You, Self attended University College School, an independent school for boys in Hampstead in North London, with Hugh Dennis where they played rugby together. He later attended Christ's College, Finchley, followed by Exeter College at Oxford, where he read philosophy.
His reasons for not studying English literature were discussed by Self in an interview with The Guardian newspaper:
"I [had] a pretty thorough grounding in the canon, but I certainly didn't want to be involved with criticism. Even then it seemed inimical to what it was to be a writer, which is what I really wanted to be."
Self was a voracious reader from a young age. At ten an interest in science fiction grew, with notable works such as Frank Herbert's Dune, J. G. Ballard and Philip K. Dick reflecting the precociousness of Self's reading. Into his teenage years, Self claimed to have been "overawed by the canon", stifling his ability to express himself. Nevertheless, Self's dabbling with illegal drugs grew in step with his prolific reading.
Self was addicted to heroin, as well as many other drugs, in the past, but has abstained, except for caffeine and nicotine since 1998.
He currently lives in Stockwell, South London,and has written about hikes he has taken around the city, of distances up to 100 miles. Since 2009 Self has written two alternating fortnightly columns for the New Statesman. Madness of Crowds is a wry look at strange social phenomena and group behaviour, and in Real Meals he visits "ordinary" high street food outlets.He has described himself as a modern flâneur.
Self has been married twice. He was married to Katherine (Kate) Sylvia Chancellor, from 1989 to 1997. Kate is a daughter of John Chancellor and his first wife Hon. (Mary) Alice Joliffe (herself daughter of William Jolliffe, 4th Baron Hylton and a great-granddaughter of H. H. Asquith, British Prime Minister in the early 20th century). Kate is also the older sister of actress Anna Chancellor, and the niece of journalist Alexander Chancellor. Together they had two children, a son Alexis and a daughter Madeleine.
In 1997, Self married Deborah Jane Orr, a journalist, with whom he has two sons called Ivan and Luther.
His brother is the author and journalist Jonathan Self.
Self started off as a newspaper cartoonist and stand-up comedian. He has made many appearances on British television, notably as a panelist on Have I Got News for You (as of 2007 he has made nine guest appearances, a record for people who haven't been host of the show), as a regular on Shooting Stars and Grumpy Old Men, a guest appearance on Satisfied Fool and a full episode of Room 101. He has also been a panellist on the BBC Radio 4 comedy series The Unbelievable Truth. He gained a degree of infamy in 1997 when he was sent by the British broadsheet The Observer to cover the electoral campaign of John Major, and was subsequently fired from the newspaper after taking heroin on the Prime Minister's jet. In December 2008, November 2009 and March 2010 Self appeared on BBC One's Question Time.His Psychogeography column appeared in the magazine section of the Saturday edition of The Independent. He has also written for the New Statesman and Prospect magazine.
Like Salman Rushdie, Self writes much of his fiction with references and allusions to modern culture (both high and low). The influences on his fiction mentioned most frequently include J.G. Ballard, William Burroughs and Hunter S. Thompson often not for purely literary reasons. Alongside these he has cited such diverse writers as Jonathan Swift, Alasdair Gray, Franz Kafka, Lewis Carroll, Joseph Heller and Louis-Ferdinand Celine as formative influences on his writing style. Martin Amis is often mentioned alongside Self; Self went to interview him but the writers, who are known to respect each other's work, ended up having more of a discussion about their work and lives.
Zack Busner is a recurring character in the fiction of Will Self, appearing in the short story collections The Quantity Theory of Insanity, Grey Area, Dr. Mukti and Other Tales of Woe, as well as in the novels Great Apes and The Book of Dave. Busner is a psychiatrist and psychoanalyst practising in London, and is prone to self-promotion at the expense of his patients. He is often the antagonist of the stories he appears in, although not always with villainous intent.
Cock and Bull (1992) ... the stories of a man and a woman who develop sexual organs of the opposite sex.
My Idea of Fun (1993) ... a lonely boy grows up just outside Brighton in a caravan park with his over-sexual mother and Mr Broadhurst who takes the boy on a disturbing and often violent journey.
Great Apes (1997) ... a man wakes up in a world where chimpanzees evolved to be the species with self-awareness, while humans are the equivalent of chimps in our world.
How the Dead Live (2000) ... an old lady dies, only to be moved to a London suburb where the dead have taken residence.
Dorian, an Imitation (2002) ... a modern take on Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray.
The Book of Dave (2006) ... Set between 1987 and 2003, against a backdrop of Fathers for Justice protests, it is the story of a London cab driver who suffers a mental breakdown due to failed relationships, estrangement from his son and an obsession with The Knowledge. He writes a book of rantings which he buries, that is discovered 500 years later and used as the sacred text for a religion that has taken hold in the flooded remnants of London.
The Butt (2008) ... a man flicks a cigarette butt from the balcony of his apartment while on vacation in a foreign land and soon finds himself enmeshed in the bureaucratic nightmare of native law.
Walking to Hollywood (2010)
Short fiction
The Quantity Theory of Insanity (short stories) 1991
Grey Area (short stories) 1994
"License to Hug", published in Esquire magazine, November 1995
The Sweet Smell of Psychosis (illustrated novella) 1996
Design Faults in the Volvo 760 Turbo (short stories) 1998
Tough, Tough Toys for Tough, Tough Boys (short stories) 1998
Dr. Mukti and Other Tales of Woe (short stories) 2004
A Fictional Organ with a Surface Anatomy of Four Lobes (short stories) 2008
Non-Fiction
Self has also compiled several books of work from his newspaper and magazine columns which mix interviews with counter-culture figures, restaurant reviews and literary criticism.
Junk Mail (1996)
Perfidious Man (2000) photography by David M. Gamble
Sore Sites (2000)
Feeding Frenzy (2001)
Psychogeography (2007)
Psycho Too (2009)
Scheduled
Entirely Women 2010
The Undivided Self: Selected Stories
Introductions and forewords
Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban (2002)
Liner Notes to The Best of Warren Zevon (2002)
Junky by William S. Burroughs (2002)
Liner notes to Before the Poison by Marianne Faithfull (2004)
We by Yevgeny Zamyatin (2007)
Little People in the City: The Street Art of Slinkachu (2008)
The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov (2010)
Narration
Narration on "5ml. Barrel" from the album Clear (1995) by Bomb the Bass
Narration on "The Happy Detective" from the compilation album series Late Night Tales, by The Cinematic Orchestra, Groove Armada and Snow Patrol
1991: Geoffrey Faber Memorial Prize for "The Quantity Theory of Insanity"
1998: Aga Khan Prize for Fiction from The Paris Review for Tough Tough Toys for Tough Tough Boys
2008: Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction for "The Butt"
Self has been shortlisted three times for the Bad Sex in Fiction Award: in 2002 for Dorian, in 2004 for "Dr Mukti" in Dr Mukti and other tales of woe and in 2006 for The Book of Dave.
Interviews
Guardian Books author page: Will Self
Will Self article in Issue 08 of Tate Etc magazine
Interview with 3:AM/Big Issue in the North
A short interview: BBC
Interview: Spike Magazine
Salon interview (audio)
Self interview from the International Necronautical Society
Transcript of Self's encounter with Richard Littlejohn interviewed on Radio Five Live by Nicky Campbell
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