Interview: Toby Young, Author of The Sound of No Hands Clapping: A Memoir - Page 3

SB: In this book you talked not only about your professional life - such as it is – but also about your personal life, especially regarding marriage and fatherhood. How do you decide who gets to read it before it is published? 

TY: I’ve written quite a bit about my wife in the latest book and, obviously, I submitted it to her for copy approval before sending it to my publisher. She asked me to change one thing - a tiny thing - but apart from that she was fine with it. She’s remarkably tolerant, though it helps that all the best lines in the book belong to her.  

SB: This is what the New York Times said: "By the end of 'The Sound of No Hands Clapping,' twin specters loom: success and happiness, with no celebrities attached. Mr. Young loses interest in Mr. Hollywood, and in Hollywood. He likes staying at home with his kids. The franchise is finished." You're saying you're not happy?

TY: I feel happier than at any previous time in my life, but I wouldn’t say I was happy, no. I’m far too ambitious for that. I want to write a book or a play or a movie that will endure - at least for longer than five minutes. Until I’ve done that, I’ll never be completely satisfied.

SB:  Why are you so scared about repercussions from the producer? You seem throughout both books to show no fear at doing things that, no offense, make you look like a jerk and/or idiot. Why stop short of naming names?

TY: The truth is, Mr. Hollywood made me promise not to write about him as a condition of meeting me for the first time and, because I was so desperate to go to Hollywood, I agreed. I’ve broken that promise, obviously, but my way of rationalizing it is by not actually naming him. That way, I can tell myself that I’ve only half broken the promise; I’ve kept to the spirit of the deal, if not the letter. If he calls me on it, which I fear he will, I’m going to say that the character is a fictional composite.

SB: What has the reaction been of friends and family to your books? I'm not talking so much about your wife as people who you quote in the books who might not have realized you were going to quote them. From my own experience as a columnist, as well as other writers I know, sometimes people get those "oh, god, he's going to quote me" willies and beg not to be quoted on this or that topic. Do you encounter that at all?

Article Author: Scott Butki

Scott Butki was a newspaper reporter for more than 10 years before making a career change into education... then into special education.

He reads at least 50 books a year and has about the same number of author interviews each year and, …

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