Author Archives: Johnny Mindlin

Christopher Fowler – Film Freak

Posted on May 19, 2013 by Johnny Mindlin

There was a time when film publicity consisted of having a poster painted, and sending the posters with the reels of film in the van when they were delivered to the cinemas. And then advertising industry foot-soldiers Christopher Fowler and … Continue reading →

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Martin Amis from the Archive – London Fields

Posted on April 11, 2013 by Johnny Mindlin

London Fields is in many ways the quintessential Martin Amis novel. At the end of the Twentieth century – ten years in the future when Tim interviewed him in 1989–there are looming portents of global catastrophe, which stand in for Amis’s fear … Continue reading →

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Gore Vidal from the archive – Palimpsest

Posted on March 26, 2013 by Johnny Mindlin

After half a century as a great novelist and America’s finest essayist, in 1995 Gore Vidal got round to writing… well, not an autobiography, but at any rate a memoir. Why a memoir? Gore told Tim that by the age … Continue reading →

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John Mortimer from the archive – Rumpole And The Angel Of Death

Posted on March 10, 2013 by Johnny Mindlin

John Mortimer occupied positions at the very top of not one but two professions. He was a great writer – we need think no further than A Voyage Around My Father, and he was one of the most eminent barristers … Continue reading →

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Salman Rushdie from the archive – The Moor’s Last Sigh

Posted on February 24, 2013 by Johnny Mindlin

Salman Rushdie is one of our most distinguished writers, having made a shattering entrance with Midnight’s Children (now coming out as a film). He ascended to an unwecome level of notoriety when The Satanic Verses provoked Ayatollah Khomeini to issue … Continue reading →

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Terry Pratchett from the archive – Maskerade

Posted on February 9, 2013 by Johnny Mindlin

Sir Terry Pratchett is a legend. The Discworld series set the gold standard for comic fantasy. Tim has been a fan since the very first book, and in this rare interview from 1995 he talked to Terry about the eighteenth … Continue reading →

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Philip Norman – Mick Jagger

Posted on November 9, 2012 by Johnny Mindlin

Fifty years a star. Gracefulness incarnate. Irresistable to women. Vain and arrogant, perhaps, but with so much to boast of. But enough about Tim. Mick Jagger is by contrast an accountant. You think you know him. The drugs. Marianne Faithfull … Continue reading →

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Iain M Banks – The Hydrogen Sonata

Posted on October 17, 2012 by Johnny Mindlin

The Gzilt came close to being one of the founding civilisations of the Culture, but they have come to the point where they are ready to Sublime to the next level of existence. You might think that their minds would … Continue reading →

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Christopher Fowler – Bryant and May and the Invisible Code

Posted on September 21, 2012 by Johnny Mindlin

A woman dies for no apparent reason in a church in Fleet Street. A pair of children were playing Witch-Hunter nearby and they placed a curse on her. This is meat and drink to Bryant and May, the superannuated detectives … Continue reading →

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Alom Shaha – The Young Atheist’s Handbook

Posted on August 13, 2012 by Johnny Mindlin

Richard Dawkins has said that there is no such thing as a Muslim child, only the child of Muslim parents. Saint Richard’s admirers are wont to characterise the imposition of religious delusions as a variety of child-abuse but not all … Continue reading →

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