Ben Okri on poetry and politics. Plus: graffiti legend 10 Foot
Life and Art from FT Weekend
Forhecz Topher
4.6 • 601 Ratings
🗓️ 17 March 2023
⏱️ 33 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week, we host a writer and an editor in conversation. Booker-winning novelist and poet Ben Okri and outgoing FT Weekend editor Alec Russell meet in the studio on Alec’s last day in the role. They reflect on the political power of poetry, what fiction and non-fiction can teach each other, and the vital role of art. Then, we meet one of London’s most notorious and prolific graffiti writers. His name is 10 Foot, and his tag is famous, but he’s anonymous. Journalist Miles Ellingham spent months with him, and he and Lilah discuss graffiti’s role and the question of who owns a city.
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Want to say hi? We love hearing from you. Email us at [email protected]. We’re on Twitter @ftweekendpod, and Lilah is on Instagram and Twitter @lilahrap.
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Links:
– Ben Okri’s piece, ‘The Famished Road and my quest for the imaginative richness of Africa’, from Alec’s final edition of FT Weekend: https://on.ft.com/3FqbpUr
– Miles Ellingham’s profile of graffiti writer 10 Foot: https://on.ft.com/3FyP3Qz
– Ben Okri’s poem for the FT, ‘Grenfell Tower, June 2017’: https://on.ft.com/40bFq2i
– Alec is on Twitter at @AlecuRussell. Miles is on twitter @milesellingham
–The whole Africa special is here, and free-to-read
– Other stories by Ben Okri in the FT: https://www.ft.com/stream/f89dd99d-32d8-35de-95df-6e791313c63f
–Miles recommends the classic 1982 documentary, ‘Style Wars’: https://youtu.be/7DXD1HBaLX0
– He also recommends ‘Jisoe’ (2014), which has been described as “the best graffiti film ever made”: https://youtu.be/gp8ZNqaG-dE
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Original music by Metaphor Music. Mixing and sound design by Breen Turner and Sam Giovinco.
Read a transcript of this episode on FT.com
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | In June of 2017, just after news broke of the tragic fire at Grenfell Tower, the writer Ben Okre got an unusual phone call. |
| 0:11.4 | Ben is a novelist and poet. |
| 0:13.8 | In 1991, he became the first black African writer to win a Booker Prize for his novel The Famished Road. |
| 0:21.6 | And the unusual call was from my boss, Alec Russell, the editor of FD Weekend and all of our |
| 0:27.6 | life and arts coverage. |
| 0:28.6 | Alec wanted to know if Ben would write something responding to the fire, which was devastating. |
| 0:34.6 | And you just went home and you wrote this extraordinary poem in the night. |
| 0:39.4 | Yeah, but you're slightly playing down your role here |
| 0:41.2 | because I'd been worried about it, didn't know what to do about it, |
| 0:43.9 | it was eating me up, and then you called, |
| 0:46.1 | and then you said, Ben O'Crie, you did this great editor thing, |
| 0:49.8 | said Ben O'Crie, the world wants to hear your response to this tragedy. |
| 0:56.5 | And it was like another charge from above. |
| 1:00.1 | It was extraordinary. |
| 1:01.8 | That's Alec and Ben chatting in our studio last week. |
| 1:04.8 | They stopped by on Alex's very last day as editor of FD Weekend. |
| 1:10.0 | That Grenfell Tower poem took flight. |
| 1:13.3 | It represented how many people in Britain felt. |
| 1:16.6 | It was read out during the Labor Party's conference that year, which determines the |
| 1:20.5 | party's platform. |
| 1:21.9 | Millions of people tuned into it on Britain's Channel 4. |
| 1:25.2 | And we are starting with Alec and Ben today because it's actually pretty unusual for fiction |
... |
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