11 Comments
Oct 19Liked by Hanif Kureishi

Hello Hanif and Carlo

I haven’t read the latest instalment of your blog yet. What has moved me to write was the fact that I just listened to this week’s ‘This Cultural Life’ on R4. There was much that I connected with. I am still alive and able to go down my art studio and paint. My oesophageal cancer is not advancing with speed at the moment, but I am aware of incremental changes in my ability to eat. It’s getting slowly more difficult. I’m only able to eat liquids and liquified food now. I’ve toyed with the idea of having a stent fitted in my gullet or to move to tube feeding but after doing some research into complications etc I think I’ve rejected the idea. I’m trying to carry on doing the things I’ve done before for as long as I can - painting, writing, activism - without being hung up by the side-effects of different types of treatment, none of which will cure me anyway, and which will only add a few weeks or months to the time I have left. Not being able to eat the food I used to eat is a bastard. I can’t snack on anything solid - I can’t eat fish and chips or a chocolate bar or a sandwich. Everything has to be liquidised, consequently everything is a bowl or a mug of different coloured, different flavoured sludge. And eating takes much much longer than before the cancer. I used to be a gulper. Now I can only take on spoonfuls and it takes ages. If I try to break the rules or eat anything more solid I run the risk of reflux or regurgitation, which can be a massively distressing experience. I have access to more controlled substances (on prescription now) than at any other time in my life. But the one thing that does me most good - cannabis - is of course not available. I have enough liquid opioid to sink a battleship but a tad of THC is verboten. I obviously still have my ways. I stopped smoking years ago. Then moved onto vaping. But for the last 2 years I’ve been baking cookies. But now I can only ingest this by crumbling and forcing the stuff through a sieve and stirring it in hot water. The last time I tried eating it without sufficient crumbling I had a massive coughing fit, which I think ruptured a minor blood vessel, as I began finding blood when I coughed, which scared the shit out of me as i wasn’t sure whether it was the tumour bleeding. I saw my GP and im just finishing a course of antibiotics, and am feeling much better. But i have to be careful. I hope to go down the studio tomorrow to paint - I am working on a triptych of Dia de Los Muertos skeletons - one is of a skeleton playing a guitar - one of a couple of skeletons drinking tequila - and the third is of two dancing skeletons. I’d like to send you a copy of these images, but I don’t know if you can do it through this medium. The skeletons are a form of exorcism, or of putting two fingers up to death. On the 7th November I hope if im well enough to give a talk in Swansea on my life in politics, with an audience of activists, poets, artists and writers - from the 60s when as an anarchist I chased Harold Wilson’s car with Ian Bone (who went on to form Class War), through the ANL, RAR, joining the SWP, the Miners Strike, Wapping, the Poll Tax, Iraq War up to the present. Also travelling in America in 1968, which was a formative experience. It’ll be a kind of swan song, im calling it ‘From Counter-culture to Revolution’, there’ll be tea and cakes, and a friend of mine will operate a backdrop of visual images and music. I’ll auction off some of my paintings with the money going to Stand Up To Racism. It’ll be hybrid - it’ll be physically there, but also on Zoom. If you’d like to watch it I can send you the Zoom coordinates.

Im going to close with something I perhaps should have told you before, but I didn’t want to sound as if I was trying to attract your attention by bringing it up. That is that my current partner is someone from your past - Julia Cutmore. I do hope you don’t mind my not mentioning it until now, but as I say I didn’t want it to look as if I was using it to attract your attention! Anyway, there it is. Im getting tired and im going to have to wind up now. Love and solidarity. I shall write something more soon. Best wishes and warm regards - Tim

Expand full comment
author

Dear Tim,

Thank you for your lovely message. We are so moved when we hear from you.

I remember Julia Cutmore with immense respect and love. She was one of my closest friends, and I loved her whole family, her parents and brother. Please give her a hug from me, and say that if she is ever up in London, I would be delighted to see her again.

Hanif

Expand full comment

Dear Hanif and Carlo

I am always so chuffed to get your replies! I must be a bit of a star-fucker on the quiet! I'll pass your message on to Julia, who I'm sure will be as chuffed as me! I gotta say I really loved Laundrette when it came out! It was at a time when we were tangling it with the NF, but the complex interrelations of the skinhead culture, racism, anti-racism, sexuality and family dynamics was mind-blowing. I'm gonna fess-up to the fact that while I've loved the films & the TV series based on your work, and while I've gone some way into your books, I've never completed one. This is my way with writers - I read several at the same time, or read a chapter here and a chapter there. I am not systematic. Whether this is neurodiversity or just me I don't know. I'm in the studio atm so I'd better get down to the painting! Is there any way to send you my pix?

Much love to both of you! Take care. Solidarity

Tim

Expand full comment

Thank you for this. Cheever is the first writer I saw give a reading in public. I've always loved his stories. And his journals are really great.

Expand full comment

I bought the Collected Stories (with your intro) years ago, purely because I liked the film version of The Swimmer staring Burt Lancaster (I am also a swimmer). After reading and enjoying the original short story, I must confess that I read one more and then put the book back on the shelf (slightly overwhelmed by the size of the collection). Thanks to your latest substack, I've resolved to pull my finger out and give the rest of the volume another go!

Expand full comment

Thank you for giving us this deeper understanding of Cheever’s life and work. I will re-read it with fresh eyes and appreciation.

Expand full comment

Thanks for this piece - enjoyed it so much I’ve just ordered a copy!

Expand full comment

Very good piece Hanif. I don’t think I have read enough of the short stories. You make me want to do o so. Love Nige

Expand full comment

I don't think I have read anything by him. Thank you for this introduction, Mr. Kureishi.

Expand full comment

Thank you for this recommendation. I am presently writing a collection of short stories and ai think it will be ideal to read the Cheever story collection with your introduction.

Always my wishes,

Maria

Expand full comment

Sensitive and accurate Hanif. I am also a Cheever-aficionado, and will get The Journals, and thank you for the heads-up.

Expand full comment