Interview

Nick Hornby talks to penguin.co.uk about the domestic male, the Booker Prize and his average day

NICK ON WRITING

I'm always rather amazed when people talk about your books as being jolly accounts of popular culture. There are a lot potential disasters for your characters and they're hanging on by the skin of their teeth.
Somebody said that it was the 'comedy of depression'. I think it is why a certain group of people respond so strongly to the books, all the characters are depressed.

I think you actually use the word depression in all the books?
I guess there are an awful lot of people out there who do feel depressed and don't find that low level depression reflected in many books that they read. Literature is usually much more crisis-focused.

You wouldn't describe your books as 'domestic', but you write about daily lives and ordinary things, which maybe one doesn't get in a lot of books.
I don't mind my books being described as domestic at all. It was very much an impetus when I started writing. I read a lot books by women and identified with them much more because I lived a domestic life - and most of us do - and that really wasn't reflected in any of the ...