The author-as-performer is not a new conjugation. Charles Dickens and Oscar Wilde were accomplished public speakers, and by the 1920s money-spinning author appearances were sufficiently well-established for the newly bestsellered Joseph Conrad gave it a go (with disastrous results: the Polish author’s English was so thickly accented that even his private secretary struggled to understand him, and customers were not happy at paying for incomprehension, however literary).
But the talk is no longer a one-off. It is a staple entertainment; an evening lecture or reading has become a social alternative to the cinema. There is just one problem with this: No one ever went into historical research to play Wembley.
Some do rise to the challenge. Amit Chaudhuri produces both novels and music and has successfully experimented with performances where he showcases both. The comedian Robin Ince is doing shows where jokes are woven around explanations of string theory. Still, as the job title suggests, writers write rather than necessarily talk. Some have enough difficulty socializing.
For those without such troubles, and a degree of fame, decent money awaits. General Mike Jackson, former chief of the British army, is at a posh hotel in Hampshire, southern England, at the end of this month talking about his life; at £55 each (including lunch), all the tickets have already sold and the waiting list is over-booked. People who have stumped up to be there make a far easier audience than seasoned TV news anchor.
“TV interviews are a form of mortal combat — they generate heat, but not light,” Jackson said. “This forum allows for more mutual comprehension.”
It also does not hurt that one in five listeners buys the speaker’s autobiography or latest book.
“This sort of audience just wants to sit in the presence of a celebrity author and receive his or her wisdom,” said Peter McDonald, an academic at St Hugh’s, Oxford. “The audience wants the author to be a secular sage.”
But mark you, not too mystical a sage: Writers doing talks usually have to sacrifice subtlety and complexity. In print one can wield stats, deploy graphs and take any amount of detours. Try such fanciness in public speaking and you risk losing your audience. Ultimately, a reader may be challenged, but an audience must be engaged.
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