Spike Magazine

Spike | 15 YEARS OF BOOKS, MUSIC, ART, IDEAS | www.spikemagazine.com
You can imagine that Pratchett would love to move on.
But can he? He’s gone so far down that road now. And,
you know, I never want to go so far down that road that
I can’t turn off it.”
He pauses for a moment, considering what he’s just
let slip, and laughs. “That’s either brilliant or something
that should be in Women’s Own poetry corner!”
So experimentation is very important to him, as an
artist. If that’s the case, why did it take Noon so long to
write an overtly ‘punk’ book?
“Did it?”
I certainly think so. His other works may have the
sensibility, for sure. But Needle is the first novel which
actually reads like punk, aside from the subject matter.
“I suppose so. A lot of that comes out of me knowing
it was time to leave Manchester. I think it’s fairly obvious
Needle is my ‘Farewell to Manchester’ book. It’s
me looking back at my life, and how music has affected
it. Note that the furthest they get back on their musical
trip is 1957; the year I was born. So it’s quite a conscious
summing-up of that addiction to the Manchester
music scene, and both the good and bad sides of that
addiction.”
Is this why we get the tour round the streets with
Elliot, pointing out places like John Cooper Clarke Terraces,
Joy Division Street, and so on?
“That part actually started out as a kind of satire on
New Manchester, and the ‘heritage industry’ they’re
BUY Jeff Noon books online from and
building up there. But it turned into something quite
poetic, almost a kind of prayer, especially on the CD.
And it also ties into things that were in Pollen, the idea
of maps in the mind, maps in reality, and how the two
coincide. Again, that comes from Borges.”
That’s definitely a theme of his; is it something he’s
specifically interested in, the idea of mapping the mind
and consciousness?
“Well, mapping the city, yeah. I’m well into this
psycho-geography stuff that goes on in London. I love
that, the ‘labyrinth’ idea of a city, and how the human
mind corresponds to that.”
Pollen certainly seems to make that match – between
the city and the person – with Columbus the Xcab
King, whose mind is the city. And he’s another of the
introverts, almost psychologically crippled because
he’s become one with the city.
“Well, there’s a large introspection in me, anyway.
A lot of what I write about comes from my childhood,
and knowing that I had this special thing – imagination
– but not knowing how to communicate it.”
Is there a danger in becoming too tied to a city?
“Oh, yeah. Definitely. I don’t think that you should
in any way become tied beyond a number of years,
certainly these days. There’s just no need for it any
more. My Mum and Dad were born, lived and died in
the same area. And that shouldn’t happen any more. We
have to move on. We have to explore.”
374
More
Spike
email
RSS
Facebook
Twitter
A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
U
V
W
X
Y
Z