“Write the Book Only You Could Write” – Geoff Dyer on His Career and Endings

The Bunker – News without the nonsense

Podmasters

News, Government, Politics, Society & Culture

4.6 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 25 June 2022

⏱️ 38 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Geoff Dyer talks to Dorian Lynskey about his career and new book The Last Days of Roger Federer: And Other Endings. In this, he examines the matter of final performances and pieces, through the tales of artists, sportspeople and writers. The pair also discuss how Dyer’s work takes shape, and how he reflects on his own writing. “The sense of not being ideally qualified to write about a subject has been quite enabling for me.” “Write the book only you could write is the mantra I repeat.” “Some genre defying stuff now feels a comfortable genre in itself.” “I think I’ve managed to turn the lack of a readership into some sort of freedom.” “If you can turn your weaknesses into some kind of strength, that’s a very happy outcome.” “The writing life has gone hand in hand with the continuation of my self-education.” “If you're able to engage the reader's curiosity and interest they’ll keep on reading.“ https://www.patreon.com/bunkercast Written and presented by Dorian Lynskey. Lead Producer: Jacob Jarvis. Producers: Jacob Archbold and Jelena Sofronijevic. Audio production by Jade Bailey. THE BUNKER is a Podmasters Production https://www.amazon.co.uk/Last-Days-Roger-Federer-Endings/dp/1838855742 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	My name is Stan. I'm at. Nice to meet you. So you took up photography where? I've always loved
0:05.5	photography but I turn it into earning a living at 60. I enrolled on a day course.
0:11.8	Well college. I loved going to college. It's good you can retry. I'm enrolled on the day course. But college?
0:13.0	I loved going to college.
0:14.0	It's good you can retrain and do something.
0:16.0	Yeah, yeah.
0:17.0	Let's talk about working, learning, saving and making the most of living longer.
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0:30.0	Pets brings so much joy.
0:32.0	From those happy greetings at the door to the warm cuddles on the sofa
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0:55.3	look after theirs with dental life. Pick up dental life in the pet food aisle. Hello and welcome to the bunker daily I'm Dorian Linsky. My guest today writes about everything or at least it can feel that way.
1:14.4	In addition to novels he's published books about jazz, photography, travel, World War I,
1:18.3	D.H. Lawrence, an aircraft carrier and the movie Where Eagles Dare. His latest book The Last Days of Roger Fedra is partly
1:24.4	about tennis but also Bob Dylan, Nietzsche, Turner, John Coltrane, Philip Larkin,
1:28.1	Beethoven and psychedelic drugs. Confusingly for a book which deals with decline is
1:32.4	extremely good.
1:33.3	Thanks for joining me Jeff Dyer.
1:35.1	Thank you, great pleasure.
1:36.7	Where are you right now?
1:37.9	Oh, I'm in London at the moment, yeah.
	...

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