KMWR: I’d love to know where and how this story came about. Can you tell us about what it was like writing “Hark at him”?

KB: There’s a line in the story which is taken from (HBO drama) ‘The Wire.’ Detective Freamon telling his colleagues: ‘All the pieces matter.’ And that’s probably also a fair summary of where ‘Hark at him’ comes from. In the first place it’s been repurposed (though re-envisioned might be more accurate) from the wider manuscript for my novel-in-the-works ‘Animal Nightlife’ so that it can now function here as a standalone story. I think writers are always recycling work in motion, or older castoffs, but viewing them with fresh eyes and a tendency to dabble but also to not let go. I rarely feel that any material is wasted, and that’s definitely the case here. Even without the narrative scaffolding of the longer story arc, it seemed to me that Vik and Luke had been bickering and bantering and expressing a bluff affection for one another since time immemorial. All my life I’ve known these characters, seen these characters, been them even, and of course, given that it’s fiction, none of the above. I think I first met them where I grew up (south London), but equally I’d find them on the page (Vladimir and Estragon) or in pop culture (Derek and Clive) and in every other dérangement that comes from knowing that, as outsiders, time is always going to be slightly bent out of shape. Which made me think, why only time? What if shape and form were also mutable concepts? Hence the human/animal forms of these protagonists. The joy for me as I was writing this lay in how quickly supposedly intractable distinctions between the bird/man and the boy/rat dissolved. The surface detail becomes largely immaterial. Rather, what matters is the limbic conviviality of their conversation. But, just to keep them on their toes, there’s no doubt that it’s also taking place in a transit zone always bordering the combative. The pushmepullyou of friends, of associates, and evidently of entirely different species too. And in these most divided of times that felt like a conceptual risk well worth taking.

KMWR: I really loved this line: “Hundreds of versions and counting, so no one really knows any more where it all began or where it will end.” I like how the line can be taken to be about writing and storytelling in general. Can you say more about this?

KB: That’s a really interesting observation. To be honest, until you pointed it out, I hadn’t given it much thought. But now that you have, hell yeah! I’m happy to go with your version. Actually, that’s the thing with ‘versions,’ they’re always incomplete, and in that sense they’re intrinsically open to further input. Pretty much the opposite to dogmatism that way. And, to me at any rate, there’s something optimistic about that. Anyway, in the first instance those ‘hundreds of versions and counting’ refer back to a celebrated dancehall reggae tune by Wayne Smith called ‘Under Mi Sleng Teng’ – widely abbreviated to just ‘Sleng Teng.’ It was estimated as far back as the mid-1980s that there were already well over 230 versions of this tune doing the rounds on the Jamaican sound system circuit. And often it would be over the ‘dub’ cut on the twelve inch record that local MCs would pick up a mic to ‘chat’ their own lyrics. Profanities, absurdities, character assassinations, and every now and then an unfiltered, compelling gem of a tale untroubled by local censorship. I always loved that, even just as a possibility. Narrative as lyric form, playful, combative, the very best kind of “further input” in other words. But it was ever thus. The put-on and the take-off of rock and roll, its signature blend of mimicry and bluster. Elvis mainlining the blues, and country, in his own unique fashion. The ‘punky reggae party’ immortalised by Bob Marley in the tune of the same name. Alice Coltrane, Don Cherry, Paul Horn, and other stellar exponents of one of the twentieth century’s earliest Modernisms, jazz, making their pilgrimages to India and back, with a radically altered sensorium. Or travelling in the opposite direction, the experimentations with form, with sound undertaken by the revered Qawwali Ustad (master singer), Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, in his collaborations with Michael Brook, and with Massive Attack. The cross-pollination of culture, of style, even of gastronomic taste which has always been the case but has gone into overdrive across the last century or so. And while there’s plenty more to be said about that, both good and bad, the element that interests me, and which I think is relevant to this story, is precisely that notion of ‘incompleteness.’ The inchoate invites play, and these are playful characters. Perhaps it’s down to their hybrid human/animal forms. After all, even with wings tucked away, or tails and claws retracted, they are never going to be ‘fully’ human, at least not in the way their more mainstream peers might understand the term. Besides, since when was a single story ever enough for souls with curiosity, with ambition, with questions? A single as in just the one. Nah! That’s never going to work. Is there anything more dull and dispiriting than that?

KMWR: “Hark at him” is a story about codes. You write, “Subterfuge, as ever, was the crucial detail in remaining undetected, hiding in plain sight.” I’m curious about what you think is hiding in plain sight in this story?

KB: Both Luke and Vik are outsiders. In some ways their ‘multiple’ human/animal forms exemplify that. Vik, though older and more established (in terms of having a career) nonetheless feels increasingly distant from the vernacular culture of the street, of everyday life. He feels too old to be in the job he’s doing – he’s a ‘trendspotter.’ And as a bird, he’s also a bit hifalutin’. Meanwhile, Luke, the rat/boy, is discriminated against for no other reason than being who he is. A sewer rat hailing from a despised lineage. To get by they join forces, and in the process discover something important about themselves, as well as one another. The racism, prejudice, and sense of alienation they both face s are as interwoven into the fabric of this story as the absurdism of their banter. And give a thought to the times we’re living in, where the dehumanising language of politicians, describing entire populations as ‘animals’ as the prelude to their slaughter, seems to have been normalised across much of the West. The backstory (for Luke) of slaves, of indentured labourers, of dark-skinned debt peons, battling for dignity, for their very survival, seems to resonate loud and clear with the grim undercurrents of what we’re seeing daily, and what far too many are, even now, still denying. Subterfuge is how immigrants, outsiders, the oppressed have always survived hostile environments. It’s virtually a mother tongue for many folks. Without it, the world they are forced to negotiate becomes a terrifyingly literal place. And that, as is tragically borne out on every news feed to the present day, is an encounter with disproportionately lethal consequences for the subaltern. The asymmetry is stark but also part of the everyday surroundings which Luke and Vik find themselves in. If not hiding in plain sight then as good as.
KMWR: Can you describe how your writing life has evolved over your career? Also I’d love to know more about your upcoming novel Animal Nightlife.

KB: Very kind of you to call it a ‘career.’ More of a compulsion really, but I’m very happy to hear it described that way. Don’t get me wrong. I’ve always loved to write, to tell stories, and the compulsion to do so I think has been there from the get go. When I was a little kid I was so bored at school that I’d just make stuff up. Imaginary people and scenarios, intricate world building exercises in my head when I was meant to be paying attention to the teachers. It helped me travel beyond the classrooms into some parallel universe where people were actually nice to one another and your peers didn’t keep aggressively asking where you were really from when you mentioned the local south London hospital you’d been born in. But I always loved reading, and I think it’s from there that my first, faltering Bambi-like steps into the unexplored terrain of writing emerged. I loved looking at the words on the page, how they warped under a magnifying glass, how they became an alphabet soup just inviting me to dive in. Of course in the meantime life, as it tends to, got in the way. In the mid-1990s I suffered a serious racial assault just two weeks after my Dad had been attacked by youths on the street where he lived. Most of that summer was spent looking for trouble, and it was more by luck than judgement that I made it to September unscathed and finally ready to listen to some good advice which, you guessed it, was to stop playing the fool and start playing with words. Over the next few months I wrote a novel, which has never been published, but for which I’m still grateful, for giving some shape to the anger, the callowness, and the recovery, of sorts. Also, for proving to myself that this was something I could do, even just as an endurance test. As I said though, life gets in the way, bills need paying, and in lieu of that big literary break which is always just around the corner, I did other jobs. Youth work, DJ-ing, journalism, academia. Nothing wrong with any of them, bar the nagging suspicion that the one thing which remained blocked throughout was the writing. Two decades later, it was only after becoming the sole carer for my frail and elderly mother, that the desire to write returned with a vengeance. Way back, when I’d been at that dreadful school, it was my Ma, rather than any of the teachers, who taught me how to read and write, to spell, and to love books. So this all felt quite karmic now. The nature of being a carer meant that I had to be very disciplined with the writing, often putting in a shift first thing, and then again late at night as those were the only times when I was relatively free. And I found I loved writing as much as I’d ever done. Seeing the words come alive, getting past all the many rejections, and then watching as my Ma was finally able to hold my first two novels in her hands, made me incredibly happy. Well, not the rejections bit, but you know what I mean.

As for Animal Nightlife, it’s a novel about how a group of friends fight for love in a world completely scarred by hate. Of course it’s about loads of other things too. Prejudice, historical violence, and the unhinging of the delicate ecosystem conjoining humans and animals. It’s largely set in the present day, though there are also older historical timelines in play. Actually, given that you ask, it’s something of a mystery to me re: Animal Nightlife and its journey into a bigger world. The manuscript won a prize, and a couple of excerpts have now been published, but overall, the novel has yet to find a publisher. I’m a bit baffled by that, but I’m hoping, given the surreal, speculative bent of the tale, and the upcoming centenary of the Surrealist Manifesto, that perhaps the stars might align and the publishing dial will be repointed in a more favourable direction.

KMWR: What have you been reading recently and what would you recommend?

KB: I’ve generally got a slew of books on the go, and now is no exception. Recently read ‘Doppelganger’ by Naomi Klein, which is forensic and unsparing in what it’s got to say about ongoing political, social and cultural crises. Been revisiting a brilliant, slightly older collection of Hanif Kureishi essays called ‘Dreaming and Scheming.’ Highly recommended, and not just because he was such a pivotal figure for me growing up. Got quite absorbed in the speculative tome ‘Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments’ by Saidiya Hartman. As a fairly breezy timepiece, enjoyed ‘The Crook Manifesto’ by Colson Whitehead. Loved ‘White Girls’ by Hilton Als and ‘Dilla Time’ by Dan Charnas. And finally, a book I’d always recommend to anyone who likes their fiction peppered with a good dose of mischief - ‘Moses Ascending’ by the late, great Sam Selvon.

KMWR: Finally, are you working on anything new?

KB: At the risk of sounding like a somewhat chaotic individual, I’ve got a number of projects currently on the go. A collection of short stories. An essay collection. A first poetry collection. And a fourth novel, well under way.

Hopefully enough there to keep me out of mischief. Famous last words…