Anna Burns

And then that has built that culture in our household.

And there's a wonderful phrase from the book by Milkman, by Anna Burns, that won the Booker, and it's about walking whilst reading.

And I now see my son, probably quite dangerously, walking along the street reading because he is so engrossed.

And it really lifts my heart.

The Good Friday Agreement has stood.

and um there was this i suppose uh new an opening for for a book that would show and in a very human way uh the the what it was like to have grown up in northern ireland i see it very much alongside another great masterpiece um anna burns's milkman uh both you know feature very hard right very hard scenes uh contemplate but there's also a great democracy in both novels and voice and yeah it's a great book

Thank you so much, Maurice.

And it's so exciting.

this stuff is, it's depressing or it's divisive or it's just the same old story, which is news to us considering how often have I seen Northern Ireland on screen in any way, you know, in the last 30 years.

But they looked up and realised, oh, well, you've got Say Nothing, this long, beautifully investigated non-fiction, you know, very toothy bit of you know slab of non-fiction huge international bestseller Anna Burns' Milkman this extraordinarily tricksy beautifully written highly literary experimental novel that doesn't use names for most of its books And it's a huge sensation, wins the Booker Prize.

I think some of them were just like looked up from their desks and were like, oh, right.

I think people might actually not mind.