My Writing Living with Sathnam Sanghera

On early childhood

“There were no books in our house, no newspapers. My grandfather, some of my uncles and aunts, and my father couldn’t read or write, so I grew up in a very non-literary household. Although, I fell in love with reading at school and at the library. My dad had something to do with it: even though he was illiterate, he took all four children to the library every two weeks. It’s quite moving when I think about it.”

On publishing his memoir The Boy with the Top Knot

“The longest thing I’d written up to that point was 2,000 words. I struggled with length. I remember being asked to write a 1,000-word column when I was in my mid-20s. It took me two weeks to write it. And it was supposed to be a weekly column, so that was problematic. But the thing that helped was going on a writing course with the Arvon Foundation. I also read a lot of memoirs, and with the help of my late agent, I managed to get it done.”

Looking back, I’m amazed I produced such a personal book. The writing I had been doing, in academia, and at the Financial Times, was depersonalised. I had been trained to rarely use the word “I”. It took quite a lot of time for me to untrain myself. And I couldn’t be that frank or personal now. The whole thing was an act of naivety, to be that frank. I when I think back on it, but it all worked out and I’m glad I did it. But I couldn’t do it again.

I look back and envy myself for my bravery. I had no idea what I was doing. You’ll never find anyone more private than someone who’s written a memoir. I’m actually very, very careful about what I say about myself, nowadays. But I survived and the reaction from my family was almost entirely positive. I published it with their permission. I ran it past them, I took out things at their request. Hanif Kureshi once said I was a sissy for beings so careful, but I didn’t want to antagonise them. I wanted it to be a loving thing. And it actually sorted out a lot of stuff in my family, it was therapeutic for everyone.”

On writing about Empire and British history

“I was in my early 40s, researching a novel about a guy who came over from British India in the 18th century. In the process I realised I knew nothing about the East India Company or British India or Empire, and yet it explained so much about me. I noticed that all the books on the British Empire were very long, very politicised and often inaccessible. I guess my research became the book. I wanted to educate myself, and hopefully, I educated people along with me.

I guess, from my time as a journalist with the Financial Times, I learned how to make difficult subjects accessible. At the Financial Times, I often wrote about finance and business, technically dry subjects. But I learned there were ways to make them accessible and entertaining. Meanwhile, my memoir was about schizophrenia, one of the most difficult subjects in the world. If there’s one thing that characterises my writing I hope it’s the ability to talk about difficult things in an accessible way. My writing on Empire was an extension of that.”

On the popularity of these works

“Black Lives Matter happened, and that made people interested in institutional racism. There was also a backlash to BLM, and that made people interested in the themes, in a different way. The British Empire happened and went on for 300 or 400 years, but we’ve never really dealt with it. I think as a country we’re finally beginning to really explore it, and new narratives are finally beginning to emerge. Almost everyone in Britain has some connection to that history, either through the colonised or the colonisers. Also it’s everywhere in our culture… from tea, to gin and tonic, tax avoidance. If you want to understand the world, you’ve got to understand the British Empire.”

On writing for a younger audience with Stolen History

“Younger people are much easier to talk to about this than older people. Older people come with a lot more baggage, prejudices and talking points they’ve picked up from social media. Young people are not so much like that. The problems come when I go to a school and then their parents hear about it and complain to the teacher, saying, ‘Why are you telling my kid to hate Britain?’ The teachers are on the frontlines of the culture wars. I’m usually long gone by the time they’re getting these reactions. But really, writing for kids has been almost entirely positive. I think a lot of that is because kids’ books don’t get reviewed in the same vicious way that adult books do. It’s the adult books that attracted the trolling, the death threats, all that crap.”

On the writing process

“I’m not a trained historian. Technically I am now, as a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, but I began this without training and I think it benefitted me. A lot of history books assume a lot of knowledge and come with a “take”, and I was able to approach the history from the position of most readers, who are non-experts.

I’m reaching the end of a book at the moment, and it’s horrible. I write every book in a different place. I find that once you’re done, you can’t go near that place ever again. It’s like someone has tried to kill you there. I wrote my novel, Marriage Material, in the British Library, and I can’t go there now without feeling physically sick. I’m writing a lot of the current book in a particular café in my local neighbourhood. I’m probably going to have to move house after this.

You’ve kind of caught me at the worst time. At the beginning, a project is infinitely beautiful in your head, because you haven’t written a word. But by the end, all you’re left with are your limitations and all you can see are the problems, and the ways in which your dream has not come true.

The way I work is a bit of a nightmare, I draft things dozens and dozens of times. Writing is like being in a brainstorming session where every other person is you – and they all hate you. And it’s like that for three years. Why would anyone do that for a living? Though sometimes it works out. Sometimes the manuscript provokes in a reader the excitement you had at the start.”

On writing about George Michael in upcoming book

“I wasn’t planning to write about George Michael, I was going to write about a very difficult geopolitical issue that I don’t even want to refer to because it is so divisive. A friend of mine heard me talking about it and advised me not to write it. She said “why don’t you write about something fun instead, after years of trolling? Something you know about and that you enjoy? Why don’t you write a book about George Michael?” It was that random. It turns out that next year is the 10 year anniversary of his death, and publishers were actually very interested. But I just liked the idea of a change of subject, I’ve written lots of very different books. Jumping around genres isn’t really how you make it, but it does keep you interested and sane.”

Advice for aspiring writers

“In some ways, it’s tougher nowadays, in other ways, easier. When I wanted to write, there were no outlets, apart from the local newspaper. Now there’s Substack, Twitter, Facebook, you can practice your writing and gain an audience from anywhere. But with AI and the death of local newspapers, it’s really tough actually making a living.

In a way, I don’t think people need advice on writing. It’s like football, if you want to do it, you just have to do it. It’s almost like an out of body experience, you can’t help yourself. But if I had one piece of advice, it’s: read books. I’m shocked by how many young people say they want to be a writer but when I ask who their favourite novelist or journalist is, they don’t have an answer. You wouldn’t open a shop without going to Tesco’s first.”

On AI and authors

I’m so disappointed in this government, I cannot believe they’re selling us down the river. I’ve noticed that a lot of people are losing work lately. A friend of mine makes some money each year writing wedding speeches for people. He said he’s had no requests at all this year, because everyone is just using AI to write these bland, soulless wedding speeches.

My work has been used to train Meta’s AI. I’ve also had a memoir of my life story produced by an AI publisher, which was just bizarre. Several people in the public eye are having this surreal experience. So you can buy a book that tells my life story written by AI. Obviously I had to buy it. One of the things it hallucinates is my death. There’s about five pages on what happened when I died. Apparently some people in Wolverhampton were upset.

AI also just gets very basic queries wrong. One of the first things you now see when you Google me is that I’m married to someone I did an event with two years ago. She was a partner in a law firm, but it took it to mean my partner. Even though I’ve written a couple of long pieces for the Times featuring my actual wife.”

Estimated breakdown of income sources

It’s often difficult earning a living through writing alone, with many authors having to supplement and diversify their income streams. As part of the My Writing Living series of articles, we ask those interviewed to break down how they earn their living.

What he’s reading

“I really like The Wide Wide Sea by Hampton Sides, about Captain Cook’s final journey. I’m also reading lots of books about quantum physics, like The Unknown Universe by Stuart Clark. I can’t entirely explain my interest. Maybe it’s because it’s a difficult subject, and I enjoy the challenge. Maybe it’s a bit of an escape. The world’s in a really bad place, so I find it reassuring to think about the beginning and end of the universe. We’re all destined to become specks of cosmic dust. Who cares about Donald Trump or my new book in this context?”

You can find out more about Sathnam and his works here.

Sathnam participated on a panel exploring what AI means for authors at our 2023 AGM, you can watch the discussion in full here.