Will Self | 5x15 & WritersMosaic

Will Self is the author of many novels and books of nonfiction, including How the Dead Live, which was shortlisted for the Whitbread Novel of the Year; The Butt, winner of the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction; and Umbrella, which was shortlisted for the Booker Prize. His latest work is Why Read: Selected Writings 2001-2021.
5x15 brings together five outstanding individuals to tell of their lives, passions and inspirations. There are only two rules - no scripts and only 15 minutes each.
Learn more about 5x15 events: 5x15stories.com
Twitter: 5x15stories
Facebook: 5x15stories
Instagram: 5x15stories

[@kc2823]

I mean, I love Will, but I do think he is is v self-absorbed. probably explains why he is such a brilliant writer.

[@markrowe5992]

Looking like a William Burroughs circa 1960's . . . It's a good look too.

[@shhlie]

As a 40 something straight white man. Finding and rooting out these hidden prejudices in myself has become a significant portion of the project of my life. I thank you for illuminating the hidden prejudice associated with the way I think about Jewish Matrilineal identity vs Jewish Heritage. Like most of my prejudices, it was none of my business in the first place. ❤

[@HkFinn83]

I knew a guy like you, same sort of issues. He dealt with his issues in a very head on way. He even underwent a sort of ‘shock therapy’ and forced himself into social situations etc with people he had previously held certain beliefs about. Good luck with your own journey.

[@user-vn7cy8qv4k]

I'm glad someone is tackling the big issues.😅

[@brawnydasco]

This is a fascinating breakdown of the ways in which cultures collide and create new categories and subcategories of human identity. Self's father's cultural identity seems to take precedence over any cultural contribution from his mother. She may have been Jewish but her willing self-abnegation (no pun intended) created a vacuum in which the patrilineal English tradition could take root and flourish. He is an English intellectual with some Jewish admixture. Should he choose to embrace his mother's abandoned tradition, he would be as Jewish as any Jew alive, but it's largely a matter of choice until he's confronted with the relentless specter of organized Anti-Semitism, which doesn't give a single solitary fuck about one's own self-conception. Identity is a choice. And yet the world is only too happy to tell us what it thinks we really are.

[@patrickwhite8144]

It's true that under certain circumstances being Jewish may be thrust upon someone, so to speak, and they will have no choice but to accept that identity; but this argument does have a corollary: specificaly, that when those circumstances do not exist, one can legitimately choose not to be Jewish. Whenever I hear arguments like this -- which basically amount to saying, "if the Nazi's come back you will be Jewish whether or not you want to be" -- it always strikes me that what the person is doing is trying to provoke ethnocentric impulses within Jewish people, rather than making a simple observation.

[@patrickmccormack4318]

As far as I'm concerned, Will Self is Irish. Though I'm far, far removed from Ireland, I feel confident that citizens of Ireland would qualify Will Self as Irish. I've been working on a joke: An Irishman, an author, and Will Self walk into a English Pub where BB King and Cris Rea were manning the bar... You Can't Judge a Book by the Cover -- Bo Diddley The Irish, you know, are Jewish. It's a comedic story which involves The Land of Giants, Mount Sinai, Moses, gold mines, defunct State Universities, a humpback physicists, a diseased biochemist, a disgraced physician, ptarmigan, bull moose, rams, sea gull eggs, potatoes, beer, a time machine, an Eskimo hunter, a tour guide, two matadors, and Jesus. Story is influenced by Sergio Leone, Will Self, Miguel Delibes, Mario Vargas Llosa, James Michener, J. G. Ballard, Harlan Ellison, Estas Tonne, and Lou Reed. Starring: Patricia Heaton, Monica Horan, Laurie Anderson, Emily Blunt and her siblings. I think I'll give it title, "God's Eclectic Children". ESTAS TONNE || KEEP ANALOG ALIVE || DUBLIN, ENVISION TOUR 2022 Estas Tonne || Beyond

[@rob1loxley]

Most mental comment ever, almost. 🎉❤

[@ryanheath9974]

Absolute gibberish. Are you okay?

[@DCI-Frank-Burnside]

Alright Will you're not a Jew, let's crack on with the epephenomenol imbroglios, please.

[@DududududuSALIBA]

I needed to hear this as a black man.

[@herratossavainen9669]

you don't need to be neither black nor man, you can be a jewish woman instead

[@rob1loxley]

I'm not a Jew I'm merely a Zionist 🤣😂🤣😂👌👌👌

[@rob1loxley]

If you missed Ur indoctrination u get a pass.

[@qwertyfiable5069]

Meaning?