Thoughts from the author.
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The author of One Weekend in May – interview August 27, 2024
RC Your book is beautifully written and deals with several complex, and yet compelling issues that most of us can relate to. Your character Lena Murshid who is suffering from a form of dementia and a brain tumour is lost in the world of Gilgamesh. What prompted you to tie this character to such an ancient poem?
GFDW The epic Persian poem relates how Gilgamesh, a wealthy and powerful man is obsessed with finding immortality. Lena a renowned scholar of Persian history is dying and like Gilgamesh doesn’t want to die. The reality of having to deal with death is something that we all experience, so the Gilgamesh poem was a good hook upon which to tie that thread within the story.
RC Some who have followed your political career, or who know you, have remarked that this story in many ways parallels your life. Is that a fair comment?
GFDW If I have been successful, I hope that most readers will find some parallels within their own lives, and quite a few who have read the story have told me how much they enjoyed and related to the characters. While some parallels with my life might be drawn, like farm life, divorce, and relative isolation, that is where any similarities end.
RC You write about Ken Graham's work with a predictive algorithm that he has used to determine what the consequences of unchecked population growth might be. I am assuming that such an algorithm is fictitious.
GFDW I have spent much of my life studying demographics and the potential consequences of a rising global population. While the algorithm is fictitious as is my character Ken Graham, the consequences that he outlines in his conversation with Rehema Tanui are real enough and can be seen on our evening news broadcasts today. People who influence public policy need to accept that we are in a rapidly changing world, a world where population numbers have grown from 2.5 billion when I was born in 1949, to over 8 billion today. That is a staggering increase and has had and will continue to have a massive impact on all our lives.
RC I read one comment from a person who read your book and complained that you had gone woke by including lesbians, and African characters. They claimed that you wrote your characters that way just to check off boxes to placate the politically correct. Any reaction to that?
GFDW First of all that is a completely incorrect use of the term “Woke”. Look, the world is full of people who want to get offended on behalf of other people. I read those comments and had a chuckle as those making them were neither gay nor black. My characters, who I believe are authentic, represent the reality of the modern world and I am thankful that we are gradually getting to a new normal where we can all be who we are, rather than who a very small minority would have us be.
RC What is your ambition with this book?
GFDW Every writer wants to write a “best seller”. My primary objective was to write a compelling story that people enjoy reading. One Weekend in May was my first effort as a novelist. I started to write fiction late in life and have at least two more books to follow. I hope people buy my books and enjoy my writing.
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