Melvin Burgess: “We are surrounded by lying bastards in the political arena”

Melvin Burgess is the godfather of teen books, but he’s tired of writing them. At 68, his own teen years pass, and beyond that, his controversial stories span everything from heroin abuse to Carnegie medalist. mess Sex with minors Do this.

After a long period of inactivity, he almost completely stopped writing. Feeling restricted by what he sees as the “new orthodoxy” governing books for young people hasn’t helped. “You can be beaten if you start asking difficult questions… [especially] like a normal white guy,” he says of his home in West Yorkshire.

To come in Loki, his first adult book. Loki, the impostor of a shape-shifting god who is ultimately punished for eternity, is Burgess’s favorite Norse deity: “Smart, unreliable, and crafty.” It uses the colorful story of Loki, which ends with the murder of Balder, the god of beauty, to explore the concepts of truth and guilt.

“We are surrounded by lying bastards in the political arena, and the whole point of this book is how much Loki tells the truth and how much he doesn’t. It’s not exactly Swiftian, but I think we live in an age of lies and untruths, so it’s interesting to watch the father of lies and how he distorts them.”

The book is the first of several novels dedicated to the Norse gods. Burgess is already working on another film about Velundra the Smith – or the god of technology in Burgess’ reboot. Odin, the one-eyed god associated with everything from wisdom, poetry and war, also speaks. “It’s really interesting, but it’s going to be really hard to write about, so I’m thinking about it,” he adds.

Burgess, who has two adult children from his first marriage, was born in Twickenham, southwest London, but now lives in Todmorden with his partner Anita. He spent most of his twenties in Bristol listening to music, smoking drugs and occasionally laying bricks. The city is the setting for the characters mess, about two runaway teenagers who join a group of squatters and become drug addicts. Burgess herself had a drug addict brother who died of cancer a few years ago.

It wasn’t until he was 30 that he seriously tried writing, publishing short stories, radio shows, and children’s literature. Angel for MayHis first children’s book was nominated for the Carnegie British Author’s Award for Best Children’s Book of the Year in 1992. mess which set fire to his career and reputation.

The Norse Gods had already had quite some time before Burgess showed up, which was related to Neil Gaimans. Scandinavian mythology and the last decade of Marvel films. “Scandinavian myths are especially well suited to Northern Europe. [those Greek gods] and her gentle rowing in the Mediterranean!” Burgess says. “These are our gods; the gods after whom the days of our week are named. Perhaps they are more suited to our psyche. They’re wilder, hairier and a little more uncivilized.”

It’s more of a book for adults than teens because it’s about adults, Burgess says, arguing that his teen books are about teenagers, not teenagers. “Loki it’s about grown-ups doing grown-up things,” he adds, though I suspect he’s not necessarily referring to the part where Loki gives birth to a foal after seducing the stallion Svadilfari.

It’s still a book that I believe teens will enjoy, whether it’s sex scenes or not. This includes Loki and Baldur becoming lovers, which is problematic in Burgess’s fundamentalist version of the Asgardian God Kingdom that banned same-sex relationships, as reflected in the 69 countries that now criminalize homosexuality. But Burgess does not stop at homosexual love: for the first time in Asgard, he turns Balder into an “androgynous deity.” This doesn’t help the lovers, but allows Burgess to explore the character’s transition from male to female.

Burgess admits he’s not in the best position to write from a trans character’s point of view. He gave his text to some trans readers, and yes, he made some changes.

“[Doing] This is just homework. Many years ago I wrote a book about a deaf girl. I gave it to people with hearing problems because there are always things you don’t know. Whenever I write with a female voice, I always miss something, so I give it to my friends.”

Like a man convicted of corrupting young minds in the past – return Do this In 2003, Ann Fine called the book “filth” and said that editors should be “profoundly ashamed”—does Burgess believe parents are still bothered by what their children read these days?

“People are always wary of young readers. But children need education, poor things. This is really desperation. But everyone wants a piece of the future. And they think that children are a part, so everyone wants to create their children in their own image and likeness.

“I like it, it’s a good book.”

“I’m a big fan of Japanese and Korean fiction because it feels fresh while there’s so much fiction here that you think, oh my god, I know that.”