Psychogeography (Will Self)

jejune
brio
arete
palisade

These are some words you need to know if you’re going to read Will Self. Nothing wrong with that. When it comes to vocabulary, size does matter.

This collection of essays has a great premise. Self intends to do some serious cityside walking, setting off on insane treks (from his home in London all the way to Heathrow Airport, for example) to discover how humans and their landscapes intersect. And indeed things start off very well. Who would have thought you could even walk from central London to Heathrow? Fascinating.

But like the long, long trek from JFK to Manhattan he also undertakes, the journey palls somewhat toward the end. The first few essays are great, alive with Self’s unrivalled knowledge of London’s layout and history. Many others have their moments. But towards the end of the book the essays got shorter and more offhand, until like the hard shoulders or traffic islands with which Self is so fascinated, they started to seem a bit, well, slapdash. A little grey and alienating.

The form, too, moves from a promising city central grandeur like rows of stately Georgian terraces (impressive headings like Walk One and Walk Two suggest that the book is going to be entirely composed of walks), to the haphazard juxtaposition of industrial estate carparks with weedy stretches of wasteland and discount shopping hangars. By the end of the book he is tossing off inconsequential little morsels about taxi rides in Singapore and drinking tea in Turkey and it all gets a bit half arsed.

The Ralph Steadman illustrations are great, though. Their dystonpian visions kept me pleasantly horrified, and the bright colours kept my baby entertained, making this a great book to read while combining musings on the future of civilisation with breastfeeding.

If this book was a person, it would be a scrabble champion with a rucksack and mild Asperger’s.

In a nutshell: Will Self walks through cities (mostly London) while Ralph Steadman illustrates.

Psychogeography scores seven chocolates out of a possible ten, including some, like the hard toffee, that you really have to suck.