Jack Fleming

Jack Fleming is a history teacher and sometime writer from Brighton, England. He’s also the inaugural member of the Jabugo Book Club, an honour I expect means the world to him. You can follow Jack on Goodreads here.

Who was the first writer you ever obsessed over?

Predictably for someone of my background with my interests it was probably George Orwell. It was 1984 and Animal Farm that hooked the teenage me at exactly the age when you’re starting to get interested in big ideas. Then it was his essays that kept me going, filled with that luminous clarity that he seemed to possess above all else and which is so appealing to the young mind looking for some certainty.

What book have you reread more than any other?

I would guess it’s Code of the Woosters by P.G Wodehouse. Under the surface, there are some quite heroic plot machinations going on to keep all the plates spinning, and of course there’s the incredible language as well. People sometimes dismiss ‘comic’ writing as somehow lesser but if you want to see it done really well, Wodehouse is the one.

What’s the strangest book you’ve ever loved?

Riddley Walker by Russel Hoban is a very strange book but I would recommend it to anyone who loves reading. It doesn’t make any concessions to the reader, but once you get it and understand what’s really going on the whole thing becomes so rewarding.

Who is your favourite contemporary writer?

This is probably my weakest area as I don’t read a huge amount of contemporary literature. I’ll say Max Porter, whose work I’ve really enjoyed over the years. Honourable mentions to Marilynne Robinson and Ian McEwan also.

What’s your favourite film adaptation of a book?

The Coen brothers’ No Country for Old Men manages to capture exactly the tone and moral message of the book in a way that no other adaptation of McCarthy ever has. The casting just works perfectly and many people come to his work through the film, which is a great compliment.

What’s your favourite non-fiction book?

Without wanting to sound pretentious, a historian called Norman Cohn, who writes these beautiful books about fanatical religious and political movements that inspired huge numbers of devotees during the Middle Ages. He wrote it against the backdrop of the 1930s and the personality cults of the Fascist movements. The Pursuit of the Millennium is his best and does have some unfortunate modern echoes in Cultish movements that we see today.

Tell us about a book you’ve read that didn’t live up to the hype?

I suppose Ulysses is the classic answer here. Finnegan’s Wake as well. Tried, threw it down, picked it up, tried again, still couldn’t make any headway whatsoever. Nabokov is another one. I know his work is impressive technically, and his mastery of the language as a non-native is incredible, but his books just leave me cold.

Do you have a favourite poem?

I’m a sucker for Phillip Larkin. His popularity masks a deep subversiveness and a technical wizardry which other poets can only imitate. Aubade might be my favourite. It just has great line after great line and is packed with incredible imagery.

What are you reading right now, and what are you going to

read next?

I normally have about five books on the go at any one time and just try to make some progress with each until it sinks its teeth in and won’t let go. Currently, I’m reading Bill Bryson’s, At Home, a history of the household. After that I’ve got a copy of Under the Net which has been casting side eyes at me from my bedside table for months. And then I might try James Joyce again, maybe this is the time!