A
Rebel Wit a em
The anti-capitalist movement makes a major contribution to this year’s Book Festival. Comedian and columnist MARK STEEL explains why radicals have reasons to be cheerful. Words: Mark Brown
hree hundred thousand people took to the streets of Genoa last month in the single biggest protest against the multi- national corporations since the new anti—capitalist movement kicked off in Seattle in 1999. The media has focused on the shooting dead of young protestor Carlo Guiliani by the ltalian police and on the accusations and counter-accusations of violent conduct by demonstrators and revenge beatings and torture by the Carabinieri. Behind the lurid headlines however, lies a wave of protest which has been hailed by
Genoa protestors practise for the Book Fesfivalqueues
the Fringe,‘ he believes. The Edinburgh Fringe, he argues, is now dominated by major commercial interests and acts which are a million miles from the original Fringe ethos. ‘The Assembly Rooms isn‘t the Fringe. Jack Dee, Lee Evans, Jonathan Ross: these people aren‘t the Fringe.’
The commercialisation of the Edinburgh jamboree has. he says, made it ‘very difficult to do anything that’s particularly radical. or. even. thoughtful.’ He is, he admits. ‘always amazed that people still do the radical stufi‘.‘
When he’s not appearing at a comedy club or on Radio Four, Steel is writing hilarious political joumalism for The Independent and standing as a London Assembly candidate for the Socialist Alliance. Over more than two decades as an active socialist. and particularly in recent years, he has noticed a significant shift in political opinions. ‘The middle ground. which in the 80s would have bought at least some of the Thatcherite myths, has now firmly rejected all that.’ he believes. ‘The most unlikely people come up to me and say, “I really liked that thing you did on such and such“, or Mark Thomas, they all love Mark Thomas. He‘s doing the most extraordinary. bloody militant thing. no compromises at all with his show. Not only that. but he says “fuck” every other second for no reason at all, except that‘s what he does. The middle ground of society all think he‘s brilliant.‘
The enormous popularity of Naomi Klein’s book is. to his mind. another example of the new audience for radical ideas. ‘Among that proportion of society who buy books, it’s clearly a
book which millions of people around the
‘Last Christmas world think you ought to have.’ he says. ‘Take it was selling my local bookshop in Crystal Palace, for Nigella Lawson, example. It s a very mainstream bookshop.
- Last Christmas it was selling things like Davld BeCkham’ Nigella Lawson‘s Fairy Cakes. David
veteran campaigning journalist John Pilger as the greatest radical movement since the 60s.
Like any great political upheaval, the anti-capitalist scene is proving to be
avibrant and diverse coalition, which is the Vicar 0f Beckham. the Vicar of Dibley fucking giving rise to new voices and D|bley, and colouring book. and what’s its best selling reinvigorating old ones. Nowhere is what’s best book at Christmas“? No Logo!‘
this intellectual breadth clearer than at this year’s Edinburgh International
His own book may not have sold as many copies as Klein’s blockbuster, but he has had
selling book at
Book Festival. Radical old-timer Gore Vidal vies for top billing with Naomi Klein. the Canadian journalist whose “ best-selling book No Logo has become an anti-corporate bible.
Nor is it only the North Americans who are giving the Festival a notany leftist edge. Mark Steel, the London-based socialist comedian and newspaper columnist, will be entertaining Festival goers with the sort of wry, political humour which underpins the popularity of his book Reasons To Be Cheerful: From punk to New Labour through the eyes of a dedicated tmublemaker.
It comes as no surprise to Steel, who has been performing stand-up comedy on the Edinburgh Fringe since the 80s. that the Book Festival has become a natural home for radicals. ‘lt’s been the case for some time, probably about fifteen years. that the left— wing of the mainstream has been more radical than what’s called
ChrIStmaS? positive feedback from people who have said NO L090? how funny it is and even that it has convinced
them to get involved in radical politics again. Satisfying though those reinvigorated activists are however. Steel admits to more satisfaction over the readers he has reduced to hysterics. ‘The warped mind of the comedian is such that. in all honesty, you’re happy if people just laugh at the jokes.‘ he says. ‘If the future Lenin has read it and this is what’s turned him on to revolutionary politics and he ends up shaping the future of the world, but he never laughed at the jokes. that would be a tremendous disappointment to me.‘
Mark Steel is at the Edinburgh lntematlonal Book Festival on 19 Aug. See Books for Gore Vidal and Naomi Klein and Comedy for Mark Thomas.
16—22 Aug 2001 THE LIST FESTIVAL GUIDE 13