Shelf Life: Jeremy Clarke

Jeremy Clarke, our Low Life correspondent, has sobered up to answer our impertinent questions this week. His latest book, One Middle Aged Man in Search of The Point, is available in hardback.

1) What are you reading at the moment?

Classic Crews: A Harry Crews Reader

2) As a child, what did you read under the covers?

Richmal Crompton, E Nesbit

3) Has a book ever made you cry, and if so which one?

No book has so far, but a Dickens journalism piece called A Walk in the Workhouse usually makes my eyes prick a bit

4) You are about to be put into solitary confinement for a year and allowed to take three books. What would you choose?

Solitary Fitness by Charles Bronson, Matchstick Model Making for Beginners, Improve Your Matchstick Model Making

5) Which literary character would you most like to sleep with?

Falstaff

6) If you could write a self-help book, what would you call it?

‘50 ways to get a busy barman’s attention’

7) Michael Gove has asked you to rewrite the GCSE English Literature syllabus. Which book, which play, and which poem would you make compulsory reading?

Poetry in the Making by Ted Hughes, The Rivals by Sheridan, Holy Thursday by William Blake

8) Which party from literature would you most like to have attended?

The Christmas dinner scene in James Joyce’s Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

9) What would you title your memoirs?

‘Out, vile jelly!’

10) Which literary character do you dream of playing?

Fowler in The Quiet American by Graham Greene

11) What book would you give to a lover?

Oral Sex He’ll Never Forget by Sonia Berg

12) Spying Mein Kampf or Dan Brown on someone’s bookshelf can spell havoc for a friendship. What’s your literary dealbreaker?

Anything with the name Paulo Coelho visible anywhere on it