Julie Burchill

Presenter0:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young. Thank you for downloading this podcast of Desert Island Discs from BBC Radio 4. For rights reasons the music choices are shorter than in the radio broadcast.

Presenter0:10

For more information about the programme, please visit bbc.co.uk/slash radio four.

Presenter0:34

My castaway this week is the writer Julie Burchill. Columnist and author, she is a committed nonconformist, daring the world to take issue with her vociferous life and work. She tends towards the counterintuitive in the same way that Jackson Pollock tended towards the abstract, and, depending on whom you ask, is either a Marxist critic or a right wing columnist.

Presenter0:55

As a child, she used to hide away when potential playmates came to call. At seventeen, she was writing for the NME, and in the decades since, she's plied her trade at The Times, The Guardian, and The Daily Mail, among many others. She's also written twenty odd books. Her autobiography is entitled I Knew I Was Right. She says, A lot of things I've done in my life have been in an effort to be alone, whether it's been walking away from my marriages or abandoning my children. Part of me has always wanted to be alone.

Presenter1:25

And therefore, Julie Burchill, the perfect profession for you is to be the writer, solitary, non-collaborative.

Julie Burchill1:31

Yes, and also the perfect person to be on a desert island.

Presenter1:34

I think it's a very good idea.

Julie Burchill1:37

I'd miss my husband down at first, but I would get used to it really quickly, and I do love my own company, and I'm never bored when I'm alone, just when I'm with other people sometimes.

Presenter1:46

You have a v as everybody listening will hear, you've got a very sweet and girlish voice, sometimes even when I've heard you in interviews before, slightly hesitant and it's very much at odds with your writing voice, if we can call it that, which is so sort of ballsy and certain and forceful and

Julie Burchill1:51

So

Julie Burchill2:00

And four.

Presenter2:02

Confrontational?

Julie Burchill2:03

Well, a lot of people think I'm going to talk like that. And uh it is a very strange voice. I've really grown to love it over the years, but it used to make me like feel quite shy. And often um cold callers will will call my flat and I'll go

Julie Burchill2:16

Is your mummy in? and I go, No, there's two reasons why my mummy's not in. One, she's been dead for ten years, and the other is, I'm fifty three years old, you clown.

Presenter2:26

And which one feels most like you, the writing voice or the speaking voice?

Julie Burchill2:29

Geez, I think I've there's like one one good twin and one evil twin. They both feel equally comfortable to me. When I'm not writing I do feel like my bad twin's been silenced and I'm a very nice person in everyday life, but when I'm not writing I become less of a nice person and bad twin's got to have some way to express itself or it might overtake good twins.

Presenter2:49

You've been writing for over thirty-six years now.

Julie Burchill2:51

Yeah, yeah, it's a long time.

Presenter2:52

What work are you proudest of?

Julie Burchill2:55

The book of essays I wrote called Sex and Sensibility, I love that book. It's got my best work in it. And you know when you're at your cleverest. If you keep keep writing the same piece over and over again, to which some extent you do if you're if you're known as a controversialist, you do start repeating yourself.

Julie Burchill3:10

And every writer has a time when they're best. I also love the book I wrote for teenagers called Sugar Rush that was made into a T V show that won an International Emmy Award.

Presenter3:19

As I mentioned in the introduction there, you started writing when you were 17. That was the new musical express. And that, of course, was at that pivotal moment when.

Julie Burchill3:24

Collective.

Presenter3:27

You were witnessing as a writer the death of rock and roll and the birth of punk. There is not a punk track in this list.

Julie Burchill3:29

Rule of the First

Julie Burchill3:32

No, no, and I'll tell you why. I'm a I'm a painfully truthful person, often to the point of self immolation or self destruction. But the one great lie I taught in my life was that I liked punk, and when I used to go to punk clubs I used to come back and put on the Isley Brothers and dance around the room, throwing off my punk clothes.

Presenter3:48

Um not the Isley brothers to to kick your list off with it, but tell me what we're going to hear first of all this morning.

Julie Burchill3:53

Can you hear Band of Good by Frida Payne? This is the first record I bought with my own money. I think I was eleven.

Julie Burchill3:59

And

Julie Burchill4:00

I was a very strange child who always wanted to be a grown up, and even though I didn't know what impotence was when I heard this record, I sort of sensed it was about something very grown up and mysterious and dark, and I was really eager to join that world really quickly. So thank you.

Speaker 24:19

All that's left is a band of gold.

Speaker 24:24

All that's left of the dreams I hold is a band of gold and the memory of what love could be. If you were still here with me, you took me from the shelter of a mother I had never known.

Speaker 24:46

The loved in the eye

Presenter4:49

That was Frida Payne and Band of Gold. So, Julie Birchill, being paid to have opinions as a columnist is a pretty curious profession. Many of us don't have opinions about lots and lots and lots of things. Do you sometimes find that you you have to just make up an opinion?

Julie Burchill5:01

I've never felt that. And one of my earliest memories is being dragged out of a room by my mum because I'd said something to my auntie Connie about her hat. And my mum saying, don't say things like that, don't say things like that. Well, I did say things like that, and I kept on saying them. So for me, it did come very naturally. I was a little madam, what they call a little madam. I was precocious. I'd always had opinions on everything from the time I could remember.

Presenter5:24

Um you have a history in print of of getting into spats with people. Tony Parsons, one of your ex-husbands, of course, Camille Palia, the feminist, uh Lily Allen, the the singer and songwriter. Um

Julie Burchill5:32

Uh Lily

Julie Burchill5:34

And songwriter.

Presenter5:36

Do you particularly enjoy being vitriolic? Does it get

Julie Burchill5:39

It comes naturally to me.

Presenter5:40

Does it?

Julie Burchill5:40

Yeah.

Julie Burchill5:41

When I'm getting into a fight or a feud, I feel a mild parasexual thrill when I'm starting a new feud. It's not extremely sexual,'cause that would be kinky, and I cannot lie about it. It feels nice. Is that because people are paying attention to you or? Nah. It's not that. I just like a bit of a fight.

Julie Burchill5:59

A bit of one, not a lot of one.

Presenter6:01

But you must have wondered why. Most people shy away from confrontation constantly.

Julie Burchill6:05

My parents were very indulgent of me. I never had to seek attention. I used to turn get my mum to turn my friends away and

Presenter6:12

Well, of course that gets your attention though, doesn't it? If you create a ruck it gets attention.

Julie Burchill6:16

Yeah, but I didn't have to seek it'cause I got it anyway. And the reason I love being alone and the reason I'm never bored is that I do find my this sounds really big-headed. I find myself endlessly fascinating. And part of that is a is my hostility and my my aggression. If I was a peaceful person, I don't think I'd find myself very interesting for some reason.

Presenter6:35

Is it important you not to be like other people?

Julie Burchill6:39

Uh I don't think I could have done it anyway, to be honest. I mean I've tried a couple of times and it didn't work. I think'cause I am um a loner and'cause I am very self-contained and very very self-possessed. I don't need I like people but I don't need them in the way I've seen some people do. My idea of hell is being clingy or having someone clingy around me. That would really make me feel sick and ill and panicky.

Julie Burchill7:04

Some people feel panicky when they feel stuff slipping away from them.

Julie Burchill7:08

I feel panic at the idea of a thing being that way forever, so I've got the reverse of clinginess, whatever that is.

Presenter7:14

I don't know the word for it. I'm sure there is one.

Julie Burchill7:14

And you said that.

Presenter7:17

Time for some music then. Disc number two, Julie Burtschill. What is this and why have you chosen it?

Julie Burchill7:22

Um, it's The Last of the International Playboys by Morrissey. I love Morrissey and I love the Smiths. I did meet Morrissey once, but it was not successful. I'd been out for three nights taking cocaine. So when Morrissey knocked on the door, I didn't want to see anybody. I was quite rude to him, and he soon left. But I thought he was very attractive, very big shoulders, yeah. Sexy.

Speaker 37:42

We're hero imprisoned.

Speaker 37:46

With all the new crimes that you are power

Speaker 37:52

Oh, I can't help quoting you Cause everything that you said ring was true

Speaker 38:08

And now in myself will I follow J

Presenter8:13

Morrissey and the Last of the International Playboys. So, Julie Birchill, you were born in Bristol in 1959. Tell me about your parents.

Julie Burchill8:20

My parents were really lovely. They were very plain working class people. My dad worked in a distillery and my mum was variously a cleaner, worked in shops and also worked in factories. But they were very unusual people. My dad was a communist and very intelligent. And my mum my mum was a diva. She was like Mariah Carey stuck behind a bacon slicer.

Julie Burchill8:40

She was forever losing her temper on behalf of her friends and leaping across counters and hitting bosses. She'd have about two jobs, two new jobs a week,'cause she was always getting the sack for getting into trouble. So I guess I was a sort of blend of both of them. I loved them, but I felt very strange and out of place in an ordinary home, to be honest. I felt like a a changeling or maybe Linda Blair from the Exorcist.

Presenter9:03

How did you get on at school then, when you as a little girl, I mean?

Julie Burchill9:06

I was very I guess I did well at school but I was just so bored with it. There's a line by the character Amanda in Private Lives by Noah Coward and she says I was born jagged with sophistication. Well I wasn't sophisticated. I was a little oik, a little rural girl but I had something in me which was very dark and grown up even at the age of 12 and I thought it was preposterous that I was going to school when I should be out there in the world being fabulous and I just couldn't get used to the idea I was a child.

Presenter9:37

And this idea of being in a house in which you didn't quite belong, explore that a bit for me.

Julie Burchill9:42

Well, like, by the time I was twelve, I was reading Oscar Wilde and Dorothy Parker, and my mother would yell at me up the stairs, when are you going to get a Saturday job? like the rest of your friends and I'd go I have another chapter of the portrait of Dorian Gray to finish today mother and tomorrow I shall be starting Against Nature by Hussmans and my mother would just start crying'cause she didn't know what the hell was going on and I looking back I don't blame her I was awful. All my friends were like really nice girls ordinary and I didn't know anybody as mean as me but yeah looking back I mean she hadn't she had a lot on her hands a lot to put up with and she didn't have my dad's coping skills. I thought they were they were both amazing people.

Presenter10:18

What were your dad's coping skills?

Julie Burchill10:20

He was a strong silent type. He never lost his temper. He never snapped. I couldn't wind him up, so I didn't bother trying. And he was just amazing, and very much the sort of man I always, you know, hoped I'd marry, and eventually did.

Presenter10:33

And his skills, his coping skills, as you as you refer to them, then was he ever was he affectionate with you and?

Julie Burchill10:39

Yeah, I guess not as affectionate as he was with a dog, but that's part of the causing working class home.

Julie Burchill10:43

I knew he loved me, and you know, he would have been embarrassed to tell anyone apart from a dog that he loved them. But I very much accepted that. I knew what he felt.

Presenter10:52

Let's have some music. What's next?

Julie Burchill10:54

It's Exodus, the Exodus theme by Andy Williams, who's got um a wonderful voice. I love this song, it's from a film about the birth of Israel. I've been fascinated by the Jews since I was a child. I don't know why I've got no Jewish blood. And when I hear this song

Julie Burchill11:11

Oh dear, I'm gonna cry. Accidents by Auntie William.

Speaker 311:15

This land is mine.

Speaker 311:22

God gave this land to me

Speaker 311:28

This brave and ancient land to me

Speaker 311:40

And when the morning sun

Speaker 311:45

Reveals her hills and

Presenter11:49

That was Exodus by Andy Williams. So, Julie Birch, this relationship that you've had with language, you were talking a moment ago about very sort of precociously reading these books at a young age that maybe I don't know. Did you u understand them in your entire life?

Julie Burchill11:57

So that maybe I I don't know did

Julie Burchill12:01

I sort of I sort of did understand them, yeah. I mean, I remember the first time I read Dorothy Parker, I can't have been older than thirteen, and I just remember like shortly like a fiend, and thinking, At last, someone thinks the way I do. And most teenage girls are reading Jackie. I mean, I read Jackie, but it didn't speak to me in the same way, really.

Presenter12:17

And in your own words, you read yourself into a frenzy of bliss. And your parents bought you a typewriter, a big sort of heavy typewriter.

Julie Burchill12:24

Oh, a big one. My dad got it for me. Yeah.

Presenter12:25

Yes, and and w they thought you were practicing your words per minute on screen.

Julie Burchill12:29

Pretty sing type thing to be a secretary. I mean, as if.

Presenter12:31

What were you doing?

Julie Burchill12:33

I was writing books in magical fantasies, of course. It started at twelve thirteen and then from then it just got worse.

Presenter12:41

Did you keep anything that that you wrote?

Julie Burchill12:43

Geez, no, I've never kept anything.

Julie Burchill12:45

Because I leave every situation I don't have anything that's very old.

Presenter12:49

Um, you embraced the a life of petty crime as a teenager. It was shoplifting, wasn't it?

Julie Burchill12:53

Yes, I became a shoplifting magnet. I'd shoplifted myself, but also had a team of girls who shoplifted with me. I'd let them hang around with me so long as they shoplifted for me. But, you know, I didn't keep all the profits. But I took an amateur out with me and I was arrested. That was the first time my parents got really cross with me.

Julie Burchill13:09

And I was kept in a police cell, and my dad was very angry that day. He shouted a bit, but that's the only time I remember him shouting. And did you?

Presenter13:17

Yes, there's the irony. Did you stop shopping?

Julie Burchill13:19

Uh

Julie Burchill13:21

Did you stop chopping? When I was cool I stopped pronto'cause I didn't want my dad to yell at me again.

Presenter13:22

Did you?

Presenter13:25

Right. Did you think that it might be fuel for your writing? This is something to write about.

Julie Burchill13:30

No, not really,'cause I was fourteen then. I had no idea I was going to get the job at the NMA. I had no idea how how I could be a writer. I mean, obviously I wanted to be one. But but opportunities for working class kids, it's even worse now. I don't think a bright kid like me with my background could get into journalism as it's been totally colonized by people whose parents are in journalism. It's really a horrible state of affairs.

Presenter13:52

And at fifteen you ran away from home.

Julie Burchill13:54

I did I became a perfume sales girl in King's Cross station. I was a really good one, but I was taken home after six weeks. This was upsetting also. My dad, when he came to fetch me, his hair had gone completely white.

Presenter14:06

Did you know anybody in London?

Julie Burchill14:07

No, no. Where did you live? What did you do? It was very good fun. We had a laugh.

Presenter14:15

Some more music.

Presenter14:17

Okay, we're on your force, Julie Birchill.

Julie Burchill14:19

Oh, this is Cocktails for Two by Spike Jones. I know you're not going to say it, but I love, love, love getting drunk. I don't just like to have a glass of wine and relax. I don't just like to sip at a single malt whiskey. I like to get drunk. And this is a very funny song about it.

Speaker 314:39

That overlooks the avenue. With someone sharing a delight Listen by cocktails for

Speaker 314:51

As we enjoy a cigarette

Speaker 314:54

Do some exquisite chants on there?

Speaker 314:58

Two hands are sure to slyly meet.

Presenter15:06

That was Spike Jones and Cocktails for Two. So, Julie Birchell, as we know then, you started writing professionally at seventeen. You got a job at the NME. Quite a plumb job to get. How did you manage to bag it?

Julie Burchill15:15

It was amazing.

Julie Burchill15:18

They ran us out for asking for hip young gunsingers in the summer of nineteen seventy six. They'd never seen a teenager in their lives, and I think they thought teenagers were like unicorns or something, didn't really exist. But I got one of the jobs and Tony Parsons well, they made two jobs'cause they liked me so much. So he got the original job and they made another one for me.

Presenter15:36

And did you enjoy it?

Julie Burchill15:37

Yeah, I enjoyed it a great deal. It was just like, you know, writing your opinions down, taking loads of drugs, going to see music. Admittedly, it was rubbish white music, but still it was better than sitting in double maths. There was a great deal of camaraderie. People were always getting off their boxes and chucking chairs through like windows. And it was like a youth club with a lot of amphetamine sulphate. Yeah, it was great.

Presenter15:58

Yeah, and when you're up of course you come down, down violently. How did you deal with that?

Julie Burchill16:02

I didn't really mind. I just took some more. I mean, I was very young. I was very resilient. I know I'm not meant to say that, but I just took some more and I was alright. Lots of people did freak out, but luckily I didn't. I'm afraid I did some bad things. Once I was sent to interview this old tippy, Country Joe McDonald, and I'd realised that speed made people talk a mile a minute. So when he wasn't looking, I put some in his tee and his PR person saw me doing it and reported me to the editor. And I was proper carpeted. I mean, it was like... being up in front of the teacher at school. After that, they didn't let me out of the office to do interviews. Nick Logan said I was a liability. But that suited me because then I just had to read magazines and revamp things. And I liked doing that. I didn't like interviewing people.

Presenter16:43

Did you see I mean lots of people who've been in that drug culture of course see not friends just having a bad time but dying or overdosing or all the rest of the

Julie Burchill16:49

I don't remember anybody overdosing, but I think some people I think their nerves were a bit ruined. If anything, I've always found that drugs have taken the edge off me a little bit because I'm so abrasive naturally. I know for lots of people they've been a bad thing.

Presenter16:58

I know

Presenter17:00

I have to say, Julia, it is it's unusual.

Presenter17:04

For some people, I think it'll be very uncomfortable to hear you talk about your drug and alcohol use so well, clearly unrepentantly. How do you respond to that?

Julie Burchill17:15

Um, that's their hard cheddar. I mean, I'm not telling them to do it, I'm just saying honestly what I've done myself, and I'd rather be honest and offend people than lie and seek their approval. At the time I was so intent on becoming the person I want to become

Julie Burchill17:31

In a way, it seemed to me that my life was predestined and that I had to do what I did. I know that sounds like a real tremendous cop out, but I felt that at the time. This is what I have to do and now I'm going to do it.

Presenter17:43

To become what?

Julie Burchill17:45

To become a person who never had to pretend to feel a thing they didn't feel, who never had to go to a boring job, who never had to get up in the morning and think, God, I hate my life, when you grow up working class, you realize that loads of your friends are brighter than you and they're heading straight for

Julie Burchill18:01

What's it called? In a factory, the theme that goes from the production line. See, I don't even know what it's called. I never had to d I've always been so spoilt just doing the job I did.

Presenter18:03

Production line.

Julie Burchill18:10

But that to me, I I'm not I'm I'm not melodramatic, but I literally would rather be dead than I've had to live my life doing the thing I didn't like.

Presenter18:17

Let's have some more music. We're gonna hear your fifth choice of the morning now, Julie Birchell. What's it gonna be?

Julie Burchill18:23

Oh, it's a song I wrote myself.

Julie Burchill18:25

A Lazy Kind of Love, sung by Sarah Moll. I wrote this about my husband Daniel.

Julie Burchill18:30

I wrote I I wrote the lyrics, Simon Wallace wrote the music, and my my late second mother-in-law, Fran Landism, she changed one of the lines, but I wrote the lyric myself.

Speaker 318:40

I wanna lazy kind of love

Speaker 318:45

A love that doesn't push in

Julie Burchill18:46

Uh

Speaker 318:52

A love that can't be bothered to be there for me

Speaker 318:57

Cause it's missed its bus.

Presenter18:58

Cause it's missed.

Speaker 319:01

Oh, it lost its key My kind of love is the mindless kind On a school day and night

Speaker 319:13

We'll still get

Presenter19:15

Blind

Speaker 319:16

Hello?

Presenter19:18

That was Sarah Moole singing A Lazy Kind of Love, a song written by Mike Castaway, Julie Birchill. You're married now, Julie, for the third time. You've had two sons, one with each of your first and second husbands. So you left both marriages and you left both children. Why did you do that?

Julie Burchill19:28

Yeah.

Julie Burchill19:33

Yeah.

Julie Burchill19:35

Well, when people talk about it, like the newspapers, the Daily Mail called me the worst mother in Britain.

Julie Burchill19:42

And they talk about it as if it was part of one thing. Um, the first time I left my marriage and my son, I could have done it much better.

Julie Burchill19:51

I was young, I was going off with my lover, I suppose you'd call it.

Julie Burchill19:56

Had nowhere to stay, no money, and I figured it was best to leave him where he was, and

Julie Burchill20:01

and go back for him, but I never went back, and I c I was very selfish and reckless, and I could have done that a lot better. With my second son, I have to say I I fought very hard to get custody of him.

Julie Burchill20:12

Um but mine did not get custody of him.

Julie Burchill20:15

I saw Jack constantly. I mean, he stayed with me most of the time.

Presenter20:16

You stay.

Presenter20:18

Families break down all the time, don't they? And quite a lot of families, even these days, you know, a parent will lose contact with their children. Usually it tends to be the man.

Julie Burchill20:24

Yeah.

Julie Burchill20:25

Yeah.

Presenter20:26

Do you think that you are judged differently?

Julie Burchill20:28

For sure, yeah, definitely. Paul Newman, who's meant to be the ultimate decent man, married all that time, like he left a family behind when he was very young. Nobody ever brings that up.

Presenter20:28

For sure.

Julie Burchill20:37

On the other hand, I'm not the sort of person to boo hoo and say, Oh, please don't judge me like that So if people want to judge me by different standards than they would a man, they're welcome to do so, because it will be water off a duck's back.

Presenter20:50

Do you care about what people who care about you think of you?

Julie Burchill20:54

I'd like to say yes, but I'll be honest with you, Kirsty. I don't give a damn what they think of me, and I've got to be honest.

Julie Burchill21:00

Why do you think

Presenter21:01

It matters.

Julie Burchill21:01

I think I was born without something. It's not a thing I put on hand on my heart, it's a thing that I actually feel. Maybe I was born with something missing, but if I was, I'm glad I was, because I don't want to be one of those people who creep around trying to get people's approval. I think they're pathetic.

Presenter21:16

And what about the havoc and hurt it causes when?

Presenter21:20

You abandon a child. You must care about that.

Julie Burchill21:23

I could have done it better, but I'm not sorry I left that marriage.

Presenter21:28

But you You do care about it. You do

Julie Burchill21:30

Time.

Presenter21:32

Why is that such a loaded word?

Julie Burchill21:33

Because to to say I care implies that it does it the the notion of regret, look, anybody will say look at a situation and say, I could have done that better, I should have done that better and I'll hold my hands up and say that about that.

Presenter21:33

Uh

Julie Burchill21:46

But regret is a an active term. It is does imply someone sits around thinking about

Presenter21:51

But you see, here's the thing, Julie. I didn't use the word regret. I used the word I used I used the word care.

Julie Burchill21:53

I used the word.

Julie Burchill21:56

Oh, there you go, then.

Presenter21:58

You see, I don't believe you.

Presenter22:00

I think you do care.

Julie Burchill22:02

I'd like to say you were right, and it would make me seem a better person and a more rounded person.

Julie Burchill22:07

But I can't lie to you and say that it's a thing that I sit around thinking about. And to me if you care about a thing, you spend a good deal of your life reflecting on it. You can't care fleetingly.

Presenter22:17

Well, you see, I think that sometimes when the things that people care about the most are too difficult to think about. So they might open the bottle or they might.

Julie Burchill22:22

And so they might

Julie Burchill22:24

I don't really think that.

Presenter22:26

Right.

Julie Burchill22:27

But I can see why you would,'cause you're a nice civilized person, but I'm not like you.

Presenter22:31

You don't know me.

Julie Burchill22:32

I can tell you're civilized.

Presenter22:35

Your relationship, just briefly to go back to this then, your relationship with your two sons. Now, you say one of your sons lives with you. What about your elder son?

Julie Burchill22:40

This is mate.

Julie Burchill22:42

Haven't seen him for a long time.

Julie Burchill22:44

To some extent

Julie Burchill22:46

I don't I think I've it's been a self fulfilling prophecy. If I'm such a terrible mother, as I've been taught, why would my children want to be around me?

Julie Burchill22:54

Well, you know, one of them lives with me, but I can understand somebody not wanting to talk to me. I do look at people who do feel things deeply and I do not envy them,'cause I've seen lots of people just come to grief on the rocks of their own emotions. I mean, it's not a thing that appeals to me.

Presenter23:11

Let's have some music now, Julie. What are we going to hear next?

Julie Burchill23:14

Ah, Hebrew man?

Julie Burchill23:17

By Ephud Banai.

Presenter23:18

Why have you chosen this?

Julie Burchill23:19

'Cause uh one of the things I love in my life is uh the Hebrew language, which I've been learning for three years. I think I've got a reading age of five. I'm not very good at it.

Julie Burchill23:29

Then some of my happiest times that I don't spend with my husband I spent in my Hebrew class and that's what this song's about.

Speaker 323:37

Speak up.

Speaker 323:39

The language of the Hebrew man.

Speaker 323:43

Well thank you.

Speaker 323:46

The language of the Hebrew man

Speaker 323:50

It is the language of the prophets, of the sign upon the wall.

Speaker 323:57

It is all.

Speaker 323:59

And sacred.

Speaker 324:00

It will open a door soon. Speak up!

Speaker 324:05

The language of the hero man

Presenter24:09

That was Ehud Banai and Hebrew Man. So recently then, Julie Birchill, in the last few weeks indeed, you've been making the news again over well, comments that you made with regard to transsexuals. It all came out of an article that had originally been written by a fellow columnist and a good friend of yours, Suzanne Moore. The arguments themselves about the particular writings have been well rehearsed, so we won't go into those now. But I do want to ask you about this wider aspect of

Presenter24:36

Of ever wondering or sympathising when people do find what you write offensive and really difficult to take. Do you ever?

Presenter24:44

I think

Julie Burchill24:45

Think.

Julie Burchill24:46

Sometimes I use intemperate language, and intemperate is the word which I have thought about, and I chose it on purpose.

Julie Burchill24:55

But I think people are often intemperate in their own desire to be offended, and I think when one meets the other it's a recipe for an explosion.

Julie Burchill25:05

I've been writing for such a long time now.

Julie Burchill25:07

People know what they're gonna get, and also

Julie Burchill25:10

Without going into the details, if you are using intemperate language about my close friend, do not be surprised when I come back at you with something equally intemperate.

Presenter25:19

Of course, given the life that you've led, the life of the writer.

Presenter25:24

Inevitably, you have ended up, especially given that you're a columnist, you have ended up writing about your life. And your life has been food, hasn't it? It's fueled your writing.

Julie Burchill25:29

And your life

Julie Burchill25:32

A writer's life is his material. I know it sounds pompous, but it is true.

Presenter25:36

And for your first husband, Tony Parsons, it was what he wrote about his experience with you. I wonder how how difficult a position that puts you in, to have the things that are the very sort of intimate details, and sometimes very difficult details, put out there in the public domain.

Julie Burchill25:51

If I was a different type of person who had finer feelings, I'd probably be in pieces about it.

Julie Burchill25:57

But I've always been a show-off. I've always been to some extent shameless.

Julie Burchill26:03

And I've always been a very aggressive person, not physically, but the way I think and the way I go after other people. For me to then, in any way...

Julie Burchill26:12

I feel sorry for myself.

Julie Burchill26:14

A, I wouldn't know where to start, and b It would be ridiculous.

Julie Burchill26:18

Uh

Presenter26:18

Now, let's talk about class.

Presenter26:21

How would you if I was to force you to say what class you were, what class would you say?

Julie Burchill26:24

Rich working class. I'm like a pools winner.

Julie Burchill26:27

When a Paul's winner lo wins loads of money, if they've been working class to begin with, you can't then say they become upper class because they win loads of money. I've thought about this. And if I was intent on moving up the social class system, I really would have done something with my voice to start with and my teeth.

Presenter26:42

Do you go back to Bristol much?

Julie Burchill26:44

I c oh, this is a sad thing. I can't go back to Bristol because I don't want to hear people talk like my parents.

Presenter26:51

Right. What do you mean you don't want to it would remind you too much of your parents? Yeah. This from the woman who doesn't care about anything.

Julie Burchill26:58

Well, I don't care about it while I'm here, obviously, because I don't hear people talking about me. But if I was in Bristol and everywhere I turned somebody was going, All right, my lover?

Julie Burchill27:07

I know, I'd feel sad and I'd really miss them. Do you think you'll ever be able to go back?

Julie Burchill27:14

I don't know.

Julie Burchill27:15

I hope I'm not so weak and silly that one day I won't go back,'cause it's a beautiful place, and I miss my friends back.

Julie Burchill27:22

I just don't think I'd be able to go back and not be upset.

Presenter27:25

It's interesting that you say it that's weak and silly. It's just emotion, isn't it?

Julie Burchill27:29

If I was blubbing at every person that opened their mouth, it would be weak and silly. I'd be acting like an income poop. I know myself really well, and I know that's how I'd behave, so it's best to keep out of harm's way.

Presenter27:42

We're on your seventh disc, Julie Birchill. What are we going to hear?

Julie Burchill27:45

Hatikwa, the Israeli national anthem. I've never liked the English national anthem. Not a monarchist and it annoys me. I remember going to see Bourne Free, the film about the lions, when they used to play the national anthem at the end and I remember my mum saying, Get up, get up and I wouldn't get up for it. So once I hear a national anthem that I can adore and stand up for and I can even sing a little bit of it.

Speaker 328:07

O Lod Baleva, Bena.

Speaker 328:13

Ne Feshie Udi O Miya.

Speaker 328:19

Fate mislof kadima.

Speaker 328:26

Ainletion Sofia.

Speaker 328:33

Oh gla jigvatenu.

Presenter28:39

Hatik Fabi, Israeli national anthem sung there by Enrico Masias. Um you've said that meanness truly is the halitosis of the soul, Julie Birchie. You're you're famed, I gather, for giving away your cash.

Julie Burchill28:52

Yeah, I had a bit of luck a few years ago when I sold my house to a developer and I was suddenly had like a few million to play with.

Julie Burchill28:59

And oh, it was at the same at the same time as I became a Christian, so that was a recipe for absolute disaster. So I just ran and marked just like giving away as much money as I could until my accountant told me he was going to take paraphrasia for me if I didn't behave myself. So I sort of calmed down a bit.

Presenter29:15

Where did you give it? Who did you give it?

Julie Burchill29:16

Oh, I gave it to everybody. I gave it to um synagogues, stray dogs, churches. I paid people's bills, student loans, tax bills just went crazy. But I had such a good time doing it and I don't regret it a little any little bit.

Presenter29:30

You're also a patron of a charity. What's the title of it? I might get it wrong.

Julie Burchill29:33

Safe even for donkeys in the Holy Land.

Presenter29:35

Right.

Julie Burchill29:35

And it's it's got a very amusing lineup of patrons. It's me, Yuri Geller, Anne Widdicombe, and the sexy one from Buffy and the Vampire Slayer. Anthony Head, that's him, yeah. Yes, okay.

Presenter29:44

See you here.

Presenter29:46

I read an article by you by Lynn Barber, who is somebody you know, a fellow writer.

Julie Burchill29:50

Oh yeah.

Presenter29:51

She did go on a bit about you being sort of a bit of an adolescent still and refusing to grow up and h how does that how does that sit with you?

Julie Burchill29:58

I've got a horrible feeling she may have been right, but for me it's great, but for other people around me it's maybe it's been horrible.

Presenter30:04

You see, I think there are signs of maturity. How long have you been with Dan, your husband?

Julie Burchill30:08

Seventeen years, which is longer than both my other marriages put together. Very, very keen on this one. And even though he's thirteen years younger than me, my nickname for him is Dad.

Julie Burchill30:18

Oh, gosh, that sounds awful Uh, because he reminds me of my father. And he's just very easy going. He's not a sulker. And when you're young, you think it's really glamorous to be rowing and chucking things all the time. As you get older, you really want something more easy going, and that's what I've got, and I do appreciate it.

Presenter30:35

Two other things that I am you might think I'm being entirely unreasonable here and tell me to well, whatever you want to tell me to do, but

Presenter30:42

Less drugs and no child. Do you think either of those things have also made a difference?

Julie Burchill30:47

I think both of them probably

Julie Burchill30:49

add to a more easy going and genial atmosphere, don't they?

Julie Burchill30:54

But I'm not a saint. Well, obviously I'm not.

Julie Burchill30:58

I just think I've been very lucky.

Presenter31:00

Your parents did live to see your success. What did they make of it?

Julie Burchill31:01

Yeah.

Julie Burchill31:03

At first they were very perplexed.

Julie Burchill31:05

I'll never forget the first time my mother had my name mentioned on the T V. She was watching a soap opera called Brookside, which I loved.

Presenter31:10

Yeah.

Julie Burchill31:11

And Karen Grant, the teenage daughter of one of the main families, yelled at her parents I'm going to be the next Julie Birchill.

Julie Burchill31:19

And my mum rang me up and she was breathing very heavily. She goes, Why did you do that? I've nearly had a heart attack. And no matter how I spoke to her, I couldn't convince her that I had not personally engineered this thing in Brookside just to make her anxious. And then she goes, All the neighbours are coming and knocking on the door. When they died, I found that they saved loads of my writing. And you know what I'm like. Some of it was horrible stuff, but to them they didn't see the horrible rudeness of it. They saw their daughter's name and they loved it and they saved it.

Presenter31:50

Let's have your final piece of music, Julie Burchill. What are we gonna hear?

Julie Burchill31:53

This is by The Beach Boys called The Warmth of the Sun. When I was growing up I was aware of The Beach Boys, but it wasn't till I met my husband Daniel that I realized how amazing Brian Wilson is. And it's a beautiful song that sums up the way I feel about my husband.

Speaker 232:08

Love of my mind Uh

Speaker 332:10

Uh

Speaker 232:12

She left me one

Speaker 332:21

I cried when she said

Speaker 332:26

My don't feel blessed.

Speaker 332:34

Still I have no word of the song.

Presenter32:39

The Warmth of the Sun by The Beach Boys, to remind you of your husband Dan there, Julie Birchill. So it's time for the books then. You you want to exchange the Bible for the Torah, so I'll give you the Torah, and also the complete works of Shakespeare.

Julie Burchill32:48

And also the

Julie Burchill32:50

Uh

Presenter32:50

And one other book, what would you like to take?

Julie Burchill32:52

I would like to choose a book by my good friend Gary Moorholland called This Is Uncool 500 Greatest Singles Since Punk and Disco. It's the most amazing book and even though I only had a small number of records with me, I could read about these 500 brilliant records and I feel like I was actually listening to them.

Presenter33:12

That's your book. You're allowed a luxury, of course.

Julie Burchill33:14

I'd like to take a alcohol steel,'cause on the island there would be pineapples and cocoanuts, and if I had a steel to make alcohol, I could make a cocoanut pineapple cocktail and be really happy.

Presenter33:25

Right, it's yours. And I'm going to force you to just pick one of these eight tracks to save. Which one would you save?

Julie Burchill33:31

I would pick Khatikva, the Israeli national anthem, I would lie on the beach reading my friend's book.

Julie Burchill33:37

Getting drunk on this cocktail and I'd listen to the Israeli National Anthem and think about this beautiful country so far away from me and I'd be happy.

Presenter33:46

It's yours. Julie Birchill, thank you very much for letting us hear your Desert Island discs. Thank you.

Presenter34:26

You've been listening to a download from the BBC. You'll find more information on the Radio 4 website: bbc.co.uk slash Radio Four.