Talk - Clive James

Born in Sydney in 1939, Vivien James changed his name at a young age to Clive. He was brought up by his mother, because his father, having survived as a Japanese prisoner-of-war, died in a plane crash coming home. James moved to the UK in 1961, and his extraordinary career has encompassed being a critic, writer, poet and TV presenter. On Saturday, he will host an event at the Charleston Festival called Cultural Café, drawing on his new book, Cultural Amnesia: Necessary Memories from History and the Arts. James retired from mainstream television work in 2000 because “he had earned enough” to do so, and spent four years writing this compendium of essays looking at some of the intellectuals, artists and thinkers who shaped the 20th century. The purpose is to “preserve the memory of the advocates of humanism”.

Interviewed in American Slate magazine, he says: “This book is built around the slow - painfully slow, sometimes - realisation that in the 20th century, the forces of destruction are not open to reasoned argument”. If the subject is heavyweight, the writing is not. This is from his essay on Rainer Marie Rilke: “Rilke had too much civilization, just as Brecht had too little: Their matching deviations from normality make both of them toxic company. Take the two together and you barely end up with one man you would want to have a drink with”. Asked why he never went to New York, despite lucrative job offers, he responds: “I felt that America would appeal too much to my sweet tooth. I’m inherently corruptible”. EC