Why We Read: Books, Booker and COP26

Life and Art from FT Weekend

Forhecz Topher

Tv & Film, Arts, Society & Culture

4.6 • 601 Ratings

🗓️ 30 October 2021

⏱️ 33 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

This weekend, we’re talking about books. The prestigious Booker Prize is about to announce its 2021 winner, and we hear what it’s like to be a judge—and read a book a day!—with two colleagues, Horatia Harrod and Jan Dalley. We explore how the literary world has changed, from boozy lunches to viral Twitter campaigns, with columnist Simon Kuper and agent Jonny Geller. And ahead of the UN climate summit, join us on a journey with Moral Money editor Simon Mundy, who just traveled to 26 countries to document the climate crisis for his new book.

Links from the episode:

—Simon Mundy on his two year journey to the frontlines of the climate battle (paywall): https://www.ft.com/content/e3bfb91d-2273-4da9-a7a7-eecf396f8d33

—Simon’s book is called Race for Tomorrow: Survival, Innovation and Profit on the Front Lines of the Climate Crisis

—Archive: Jan Dalley’s lunch with “naughty old thing” Booker Prize administrator Martyn Goff: https://www.ft.com/content/3e17b618-b4a0-11da-bd61-0000779e2340

—The Booker Prize 2021 shortlist and longlist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_Booker_Prize

—Simon Kuper on how book promotion has changed: https://www.ft.com/content/7dbc7e21-904c-492e-9313-5ce665a5ec45

—To follow our COP26 coverage, here’s Climate Capital. The entire FT will be free to read on Wednesday: https://www.ft.com/climate-capital

Want to say hi? Email us at [email protected]. We’re on Twitter @ftweekendpod, and Lilah is on Instagram and Twitter @lilahrap.

For an exclusive 50% online subscription (and a discounted FT Weekend print subscription!), follow this link: http://ft.com/weekendpodcast

To watch the NextGen festival sessions, go here: www.nextgen.live.ft.com and use the promo code FTNextGenx2021

Sound design and mixing is by Breen Turner, with original music by Metaphor Music.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Yesterday I was standing in my kitchen, making coffee, and watching the head of Instagram tell me
0:05.7	that Facebook had changed its corporate name to meta. He said they're envisioning this
0:10.7	metaverse, which is an internet that you're not on but in, and that in 15 years will likely be
0:16.8	in the internet all the time, and that there will be even less delineation between real and virtual
0:22.7	than there already is. So I was sitting there with my coffee, kind of reeling from this
0:27.6	dystopian Zuckerberg vision and looking around my apartment and seeing all these little piles of
0:33.7	books that have collected on different surfaces, like physical tactile books made of paper
0:38.6	and ink. And I thought, how are books surviving this? Isn't it surprising that we still read?
0:44.8	I'm so relieved that we still read. We're all sitting here trying to meditate and resist technologies
0:51.2	that are built to addict us. But the book industry is still thriving.
0:56.8	Almost $88 billion worth of books were sold in 2020 around the world,
1:01.3	and that number is projected to grow to more than $92 billion this year.
1:05.7	We read hard things, we read easy things, we read to make things make sense,
1:10.6	we read to empathize. Sure, sometimes we read digital things, we read to make things make sense, we read to empathize.
1:12.3	Sure, sometimes we read digital books, sometimes we listen to books, but we still read.
1:18.0	Honestly, go books, you know? Fight the power.
1:23.9	This is FT Weekend, the podcast. I'm Lila Raptopoulos. This weekend, we're talking about books.
1:30.0	The winner of the prestigious Booker Prize will be announced Wednesday, and two of my colleagues will tell us what it's like to judge it.
1:36.2	We'll also look at the literary world and how it's changed over the years, with a high-profile literary agent who's seen it all, and with FT columnist Simon Cooper,
1:45.0	who's written books right through it. But first up, Sunday marks the first day of COP 26 in Glasgow.
1:52.2	It's the UN Climate Change Conference and the most important climate summit of the year.
1:56.9	You may remember, COP21 is where the Paris Agreement was signed in 2015.
	...

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