Few writers can dream of the kind of success and experience achieved by British author Tony Parsons. After dropping out of school at 16, Parsons published his first novel and made a name for himself in the seventies as a music journalist with NME, the British equivalent of Rolling Stone, where he profiled bands like The Clash and The Sex Pistols. He went on to win awards writing for magazines like GQ and became a household name as a regular on the television program Late Review. Last year he published his monster bestseller \Man and Boy"" about single fatherhood, and has followed it up with a sequel, ""Man and Wife,"" due out later this month. The Daily Cardinal recently caught up with Tony Parsons.
The Daily Cardinal: Do you have a favorite story or a favorite memory from being a music journalist?
Tony Parsons: I think my favorite story was when Iggy Pop tried to steal my girlfriend ... so that was quite traumatic. You know, he did offer me his own girlfriend in exchange, so he's a true rock 'n' roll leather-pantied gentleman, but he was very persistent. I'd become quite friendly with him ... The fact that he tried to steal my girlfriend ... was no way to thank me.
He came up to the NME and he finally stopped trying and trying to get my girlfriend off me and he wanted some drugs, you know, he wanted a connection. So I got a packet of laxatives and took them out and put them in a dusty cellophane bag and gave him those instead ... which made it for quite an interesting performance at the Rainbow. He kept disappearing behind these amps, and so, you know, revenge was sweet ... I quite like that because I can now, looking back on it, I can hardly believe that any of it actually happened, that someone would come to me for a drug connection, but it was a good time.
One of my happiest memories is also of Iggy Pop going into a jazz bar in Copenhagen with these bearded jazz musicians onstage and Iggy and his band just taking up their instruments and playing ""Search and Destroy"" and Iggy swinging from chandeliers and dropping barechested on a table. ... A lot of good times, and the good thing about that time is that the older generation, people like the Rolling Stones and Bowie, were still around and very much on the scene. So I got to meet them and spend a bit of time with them, actually became quite good friends with Bowie. It wasn't just the new generation of bands, it was an act like the Rolling Stones. They didn't sing quite like the vaudeville turn as they do now and prancing around, they were actually still in their mid 30s.
DC: What made you decide to go back to fiction after being a music journalist?
TP: I think that every journalist thinks they've got a novel inside them. ... I think the story finds you if you've got a good story. ... And it was nagging at me and I filled up--it was just something I wanted to get it out of my system ... thought a few people might like it. You can't set out to conquer the hearts of millions. You'd write an awful book if you did that.
You write the first book for yourself essentially. It means so much to me that people like it so much--people love it. It's completely different--it changes your life when you write a book that big. The initial story just found me.
DC: What are you working on now? What are your current projects?
TP: I'm writing a tv series called ""Hello Gorgeous"" and I think there's a lot of strong writing. ... It's about four brothers in Essex, which is kind of the English equivalent of New Jersey, blue-collar county that everybody makes fun of people kind of look down at it, which is where I grew up. I read an interview with David Chase, the brains behind ""The Sopranos,"" and he said when he was growing up he never saw the New Jersey that he lived in represented in movies and I felt, boy, you know, I feel exactly the same way about Essex. And ... a novel about pregnancy.
DC: Now do you have any advice you'd like to give to aspiring writers?
TP: Yeah, I'd just say don't listen to anybody that puts any kind of limitation on you. ... I certainly grew up with that. Just people telling me that it wasn't something that someone from my background could or should even consider for a career. So I just think, don't believe the rejection slips that they will bury you in. Burn your rejection slips and never give up. And just be true to yourself, I'd say write the kind of stories that you would like to read, and you will not go far wrong.
