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[Music]
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monika ali is a bangladeshi born british
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writer and best-selling novelist
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whose work has been translated into over
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26 languages
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she was selected as one of the best of
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young british novelists by granta
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magazine based on her unpublished
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manuscript bricklane
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it was shortlisted for the man booker
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prize and adapted into a 2007 film of
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the same name
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she has multiple other works her latest
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effort love marriage
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recently having its tv rights sold
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successfully it is my great pleasure and
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privilege to welcome my next guest in
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the waiting room monica ali monica thank
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you so so much for joining us today
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pleasure thanks for having me here no at
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all and as with so many of our guests
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i'd like to ask you to begin your
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journey with your parents and telling us
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about who they are and where were they
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born
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so my mum is english and she was born in
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preston in the northwest
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of england
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she met my father who is
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bangladeshi
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at a dance
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in well actually it was in bolton i
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think not preston
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and
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that was in the early 1960s
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and they
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got together
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which was
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a terrible thing
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that my father did in terms of his own
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family because
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he had promised his dad
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that he would get married to the girl
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that had been chosen for him after he'd
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finished his studies abroad
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but then my mum came along and
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ruined that plan
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um
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he went back to dhaka it was east
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pakistan then
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wasn't yet bangladesh
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he went back to dhaka and
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my mother
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followed on six months later she had
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some things to to do before
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um
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she went
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and transferred her whole life to the
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other side of the world
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and
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they spent
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uh
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seven or eight years
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there
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uh i was born in 67
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and then
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the war broke out the war of
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independence broke out in 1971 and
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that's when
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uh
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my mother took me and my brother
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and came to england
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what was the
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um experience of your mother coming to
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dhaka and and what was the sort of
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reception for her when she came
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yeah so i mean that's something that's
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fascinated me
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all my life really and i think in some
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ways it linked into my
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first novel because although
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the the heroine the protagonist of brick
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lane has the opposite journey to my mum
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i think i always had in the back of my
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mind you know what's it like to to to
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just
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see everything through it's almost like
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an alien's eyes you know the sort of
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martian poetry that craig rain wrote you
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know that idea of defamiliarization
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how does the world
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look
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to somebody who's just dropped into it
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as she was at the time
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um because she went there not knowing
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the language
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not knowing anything about the culture
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not really knowing much about their
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religion not having any contacts there
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apart from my dad
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um
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so
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i
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i think that was a very intense
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experience there's lots of stories that
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i've heard about
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that it was also very intense for my
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father because his
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his father cut him off
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because he had lost faith
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basically and they never really repaired
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that damage can you tell us any of your
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earliest memories there
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only really around the time of
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when the
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the war broke out and it was a time of
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terrible
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turmoil and
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violence
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and
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we had to um
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hide under the bed when the troops were
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going past and there were you know tanks
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rolling in the street and there was a
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plan
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um
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that if that
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they came into the building
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there was a
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balcony and there's a particular mango
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tree that you could reach from the
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from the balcony and it was all
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carefully planned out
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how he would have to
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who would go first into the tree and
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pass the children over so i remember
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that sort of sense of
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um
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just tension i think and
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fear rather than
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uh
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[Music]
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rather than any of the specifics the
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specifics i've probably
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learnt
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as a as a story later but that sense of
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oh my gosh the world can change
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in a moment
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you know everything that you've got
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everything that you have everything that
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you know
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can just go like that
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is
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i think the sense that maybe i still
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carry to a certain extent i don't tend
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to take things for
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granted too much i feel the fragility of
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of life
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so but my mum
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brought me and my brother
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we had to go to the airport
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several times over because everyone
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all the expats and other people were
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trying to get out
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and
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you know we we had to
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sort of make our way
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through the crowds try and push through
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the crowds to get
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to the airplane
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um
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which we did eventually on the sort of i
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don't know fourth or fifth
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attempt
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my dad wasn't allowed to leave because
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they weren't letting any
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um
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well east pakistan
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nationals out
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so we had to make that journey
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uh
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without him
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um
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and my mum was very worried that my
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brother would start speaking bengali on
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the airport and we wouldn't be allowed
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on so she was stuffing us with
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boiled sweets to keep keep us quiet and
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then you know suddenly the world changed
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because
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then we were
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in england
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what happened next in your journey
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so
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my
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maternal grandparents had been actually
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fine with my mum marrying
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my dad um
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i think because at the time
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there were hardly any asian
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immigrants in the north
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west of england and
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most that were there were students and
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it wasn't you know it wasn't such a
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terrible thing
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but by the time we returned there'd been
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quite a
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a growth in the population um
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mill workers
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um
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a lot of people were mill workers
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and my grandparents
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just weren't
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terribly thrilled about um
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my mum's
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husband choice and
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her having these little brown children
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and they just say things like my
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grandmother would say things like well
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you know if you dress them carefully
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enough
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nobody will you know maybe nobody will
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know or fewer people will know so which
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shouldn't go down very well with my mom
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i mean you know i think it was much more
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traumatic for my mum to be honest um
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because
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i wasn't aware of a lot of that again i
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was just aware of
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tension
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and something missing um which was my
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dad he was
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so he spent six months in india firstly
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in a refugee camp in
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um
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near in calcutta and then
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elsewhere in india but yeah my mum was
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writing to the mp her local mp and
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trying to get
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permission for him to
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come over
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meanwhile uh
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when he'd
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gone to the refugee camp
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he'd
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seen the people who were organizing and
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in charge and they'd asked see his
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documents and they destroyed them
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because this passport because
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i mean these were from people from east
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course pakistan
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uh yeah then he eventually did yes yes
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yeah you took about six seven months
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something like that and then he got
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permission to travel
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yeah something very interesting that you
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said was i didn't really know what i
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wanted to be all i knew was i wanted to
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be invisible i mean that that
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i can't remember saying it but it makes
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sense um and i connect that to
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reading actually because
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novels i mean all books but novels in
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particular were an escape
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and
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they
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they were the place that i could
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lose myself
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but did you have a firm idea of who you
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were and what your identity was we
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didn't talk in terms of identity back
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then i mean i don't think i'd ever heard
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the word i did stupid oh i left school i
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mean that wasn't
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a question it wasn't raised
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so i certainly didn't think about
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it in those
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terms
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i mean
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for me
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to pick another even more newfangled
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terms non-binary i mean
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everything for me is non-binary it's not
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either or it's
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i am this and i am that
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um
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and
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the frustration for me often lies i
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think in
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in the idea that you should have a fixed
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self which
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reflects accurately to the
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outside viewer
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who you are because
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who you are
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or certainly in my case
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is a constantly evolving constantly
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shifting constantly changing
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set of dynamic
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processes in relationship to the outside
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world
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and
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you know that's something that i've come
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to
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appreciate even more as i get older
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and i think it's quite damaging that
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that idea that
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you are one fixed thing or two fixed
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things absolutely
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i mean we all contain multitudes
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and develop them over time yeah with our
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experiences
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was education important to you was it
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instilled upon you
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yes
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yes um
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very firmly
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so
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um but i you know i enjoy i enjoyed
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school i enjoyed school work
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um i was good at it i was good at exams
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um i got a free place out of my brother
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at the local
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independent school
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it was a very good schools girls school
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which was handy as well
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um
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yeah i worked
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hard for my o levels and my a levels and
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i
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saw it as a means of
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you know taking
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control of my life and my destiny
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i didn't know what i wanted to do with
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it but i just
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thought that was
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yeah the way forward and the way out
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and you went to a very illustrious
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institution
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in pursuit of your education tell us
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about that
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yeah so i went to wadham college oxford
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and i studied
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philosophy politics and economics
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and
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my
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grandparents
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took me down in their orange combi van
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and everyone else was turning up with
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their parents with their you know big
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posh cars and
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i was bundling my my duvet out of that
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a little campervan anyway it was yeah
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it's funny looking back on it um
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but yeah i mean i thoroughly enjoyed my
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time much
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at wadham it was yeah it was a
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great three years and i made so many
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friends
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there and some of them are you know
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still
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my best friends in life and and now you
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did other things before you became a
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writer
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yeah i hadn't really found
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what i wanted to
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do in life despite all this you know
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freedom that i've been keen to have
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and i think part of
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what had been holding me back was just
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fear again
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i mean it seemed kind of a ridiculous
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thing to do to want to write a novel
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right it's not
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yeah i mean
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it didn't seem like a reasonable
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thing to
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want to do i thought i should be earning
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some money and i i had
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young children so you know when i went
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back to work i should contribute to the
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household bills and
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anyway
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it was the day after my grandfather's
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funeral
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i actually started writing what turned
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into
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brick lane and as we know
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that seminal writing of yours
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turned into brick lane
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which
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enamored fans all over the world and as
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i've mentioned has been translated into
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over 26 languages was turned into a film
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did you have any sense when you first
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were writing that any of that was what
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would follow
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no no i mean
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it's
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it's a book about a bangladeshi
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housewife
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and
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i would have had to have been
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you know crazy to think
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that that was going to be some kind of
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hit i mean who's interested in
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bangladeshi housewives certainly not at
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that time
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that i was writing
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back in 2000 2001
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definitely not and
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it wasn't even a multi-cultural
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cool kind of book it's pretty
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mono-cultural
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so
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that wasn't the goal that wasn't the aim
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there were things that i wanted to
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explore
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in the writing i already mentioned
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you know my mom's experience of
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of
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going to dhaka and that
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total
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sense of
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cultural social dislocation
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i was interested to explore that i
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wanted to
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see if i could
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write because that novels have always
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meant so much to me in my life
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but the idea that it was going to be a
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sort of
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money spinner or something
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no not at all
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um and and and i think it's only fair
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that you are the person who tells is
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part of your story and i've only read
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things and i suppose experience things
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um but but there was a backlash from the
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people who live on brick lane um
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which which seemed
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bemusing uh to to many of us um but what
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was your experience of it as you're the
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rightful person who really lived through
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it yeah uh well it well i mean it was
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interesting it was
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basically around the the filming
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so that was a few years
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later
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but
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the narrative seems
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to be and it's hard to shift a narrative
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once it's taken root
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um
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that
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people with a bangladeshi heritage
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um you know didn't like
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brick lane which you know couldn't be
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further from the truth of my experience
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i mean i've had so many
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readers for the bangladeshi heritage not
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just here but all around the world
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um
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who have written to me or spoken to me
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at events and so on and
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just you know
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actually the book spoke to them they
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wanted to talk to me about what it meant
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to them so it's been the total opposite
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of
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this
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narrative
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um
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however
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there were one or two
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older
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conservative
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um
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[Music]
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self-appointed i believe leaders um
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in the area
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who
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decided that
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they were offended by the book
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never having read it which
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you know
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which they said in interviews um
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so they
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promised
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book burnings and said there would be a
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demonstration and sort of hinted at
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violence
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you know that they themselves were
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peaceful but they couldn't account for
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what other other younger people
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might do
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and the film producers decided to
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relocate the filming away from brick
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lane as a result of that which
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um
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i mean it didn't
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harm
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the film they
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just filmed elsewhere but
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you know it it's
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i remember i was i was i i used to be a
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patron of the the atlee
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[Music]
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youth club
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around there um
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and i was i was at the
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youth club
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filming for something else for an
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interview and one of the journalists
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there's talk or photographer actually
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said that he'd covered the demonstration
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and
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he said there were more
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um members of the media there
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were demonstrators they had to get in
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really close to make it sort of look as
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though it was a
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demonstration
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and
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[Music]
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the director of the movie sarah gavron
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she told me that a thousand people had
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queued to be local people in the area
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accused to be extras
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in the film which is against like 40 50
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people all men apart from two women
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apparently
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um
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who took part in the demonstration
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so
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that sort of gives you the
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balance i know you do a lot of yoga
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yeah and and find i hope a lot of joy
00:21:02
and and perhaps to some degree some
00:21:03
therapy
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has
00:21:06
anxiety
00:21:07
uh or depression ever touched your life
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at all yeah
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for sure kind enough to share that with
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us
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yeah um i mean i think i'm sort of
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anxious by
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well i really don't say disposition but
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how much of that disposition is
00:21:25
conditioned by
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um
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the way that you've
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grown up
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um but yeah i'm sort of habitually
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anxious
00:21:34
um
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you know it shouldn't matter to you what
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people are saying
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shouldn't matter how much
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you know your writing is derided and
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and
00:21:48
trampled on you you've always done what
00:21:50
you want to do monica
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you believe in the work that should be
00:21:54
enough
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so i felt very
00:21:57
sort of
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feeble
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um
00:22:04
for getting depressed and
00:22:06
the sort of self-loathing
00:22:08
comes into play at that point um
00:22:12
and i was
00:22:13
you know i was never so depressed that i
00:22:15
couldn't function
00:22:17
because i had children to get to school
00:22:19
and stuff like that but i would get them
00:22:20
to school and some days i would just go
00:22:22
back to bed
00:22:24
and
00:22:26
um there was a time when i you know i
00:22:30
decided i'd better not
00:22:32
carry on writing because it will just
00:22:35
be
00:22:36
um
00:22:38
more trouble than it's worth there was a
00:22:39
time when i couldn't even read i just
00:22:41
could not read and i read
00:22:43
all my life i've been a huge reader it's
00:22:46
such a central thing in my
00:22:49
life there was a time when i couldn't
00:22:50
even
00:22:51
bring myself to pick up a novel i'm
00:22:54
shocked actually hearing from you that
00:22:56
at some point you weren't even able to
00:22:58
read up a book
00:22:59
to read given how passionate you are
00:23:01
about reading and
00:23:02
from the privilege we've had of hearing
00:23:04
about your journey
00:23:06
can you explain to us
00:23:08
and educate me
00:23:09
and for the benefit of other people who
00:23:11
may be feeling that and we've heard of
00:23:13
many other people jk rowling
00:23:15
once went through exceptional depression
00:23:18
and then it's clear in her books as well
00:23:22
what made you seek help
00:23:24
whether it was the nhs or not what made
00:23:26
you seek help
00:23:28
and
00:23:29
what form that help took and what
00:23:30
benefit has had for you
00:23:35
he said i think when i was really down i
00:23:38
was too
00:23:40
down
00:23:42
to go
00:23:44
to go and get help and i was too
00:23:48
um
00:23:49
moment-to-moment
00:23:51
getting through and focusing all my
00:23:53
energy on
00:23:55
raising my children and that was the
00:23:57
only priority and
00:24:00
everything else had to go on the
00:24:02
back burner and it's only really
00:24:06
um
00:24:08
what the last four or five years that
00:24:13
i've had
00:24:15
the kind of
00:24:21
well
00:24:22
i was going to say the time but it's not
00:24:23
even really the time it's i've given
00:24:26
myself permission i think that's what it
00:24:28
is i've given myself permission
00:24:31
to
00:24:33
say
00:24:34
it's okay to go and get some help
00:24:37
and what has been the benefit of of
00:24:39
having therapy
00:24:43
i think that i'm kinder to myself
00:24:47
i think that's um
00:24:49
that well there's a a place to go and
00:24:52
talk about
00:24:54
yourself
00:24:56
and that time you're supposed to talk
00:24:59
about yourself
00:25:00
so you don't have that feeling of
00:25:04
oh really monica what are you moaning on
00:25:06
about
00:25:09
so so there's that contained
00:25:11
space
00:25:13
and that contain time
00:25:15
where again you're given permission to
00:25:17
do that and what i've learned from it is
00:25:20
really to be
00:25:24
less
00:25:25
judgmental of myself
00:25:28
and to also to think about
00:25:32
the
00:25:32
[Music]
00:25:34
little girl that
00:25:35
i was
00:25:37
and
00:25:40
um
00:25:41
you know i sort of acknowledged that she
00:25:44
had a
00:25:46
bit of a
00:25:47
harder time
00:25:50
i'd ever really admitted i think you
00:25:52
underplay it massively i think
00:25:55
and this is the great privilege that i
00:25:57
have and be able to hear your story i
00:25:58
think you went through an incredible
00:26:00
upheaval multiple times as did your
00:26:02
parents and your siblings
00:26:04
and and now you're the wonderful person
00:26:06
that you are so i'm glad to hear you at
00:26:08
least acknowledge it
00:26:10
of everything you went through
00:26:12
in the latter parts of our interview
00:26:15
were there any stories directly with the
00:26:17
nhs or health care that you've had
00:26:19
alongside your journey
00:26:22
well i've been very lucky in terms of
00:26:26
my own health and my
00:26:28
family's health so my only
00:26:31
um experiences with the nhs have really
00:26:34
been around the birth of my children
00:26:38
which have been
00:26:39
great experiences
00:26:42
um i believe another thing that you
00:26:44
suffer from is insomnia
00:26:46
and has that ever bothered you in any
00:26:48
way or it's something that you just
00:26:49
adapt to
00:26:50
yeah i mean actually it's been so much
00:26:52
better in recent years um
00:26:56
so it started it started when my son was
00:26:59
born i mean i don't want to blame him i
00:27:02
am blaming him
00:27:04
he he was a really bad sleeper and he
00:27:06
was a baby so he'd wake up a lot i mean
00:27:10
you know probably no more than
00:27:13
most babies but i had a problem he'd go
00:27:15
back to sleep and i had a problem
00:27:17
getting back to sleep and i'd fed him
00:27:19
and put him down i just couldn't get
00:27:20
back to sleep so i did
00:27:24
start to feel very anxious about that
00:27:28
but then i decided
00:27:30
instead of worrying about
00:27:33
being awake i just do something
00:27:35
constructive
00:27:37
and i started writing short stories
00:27:39
in in the night i mean before i
00:27:42
started on
00:27:44
the novel that turned into brick lane
00:27:46
so but that's how i sort of cut my teeth
00:27:49
writing short stories in the night
00:27:52
when i was
00:27:53
feeling insomniac and i was about you
00:27:56
know i was very tired in the day but it
00:28:00
it it kind of saved me
00:28:02
because
00:28:03
rather than feeling
00:28:05
resentful and oh god you know
00:28:08
isn't it awful
00:28:10
that i'm awake
00:28:11
i thought well here i am i'm learning
00:28:14
something there's also something quite
00:28:16
magical about those
00:28:18
early hours of the morning
00:28:20
yes when everything is still
00:28:23
and you feel like you're the only person
00:28:26
awake
00:28:27
going back to your
00:28:29
depression if if i was to ask you to
00:28:32
put all of your worst experiences and
00:28:34
summarize them
00:28:36
in in a day of of the things you
00:28:38
wouldn't be able to do word associations
00:28:41
just so that
00:28:43
people who suffer from it can relate but
00:28:45
also perhaps more imp people who have no
00:28:48
notion of what depression is and
00:28:50
and really are quite dismissive of it
00:28:53
that you're just sad or you're tired and
00:28:55
not appreciate the debilitating effect
00:28:57
it can have
00:28:58
and people will see you they will see
00:29:00
your success
00:29:01
they will see your acclaim and have no
00:29:04
idea
00:29:05
of the crippling effects they clearly
00:29:07
had
00:29:08
and so if you could gift me with that
00:29:09
and share with the rest of us
00:29:12
at its very worst moments what
00:29:14
depression can be like
00:29:16
ah it's like wading through porridge
00:29:21
with
00:29:24
chains around your
00:29:26
ankles
00:29:28
there's that heaviness
00:29:32
sky pressing down on you
00:29:38
i mean it's it it's a kind of
00:29:42
bleakness
00:29:44
inside you know the weather conditions
00:29:46
inside
00:29:48
are
00:29:50
just
00:29:50
like sleet
00:29:58
and then and and in some ways it does
00:30:01
feel like fatigue
00:30:04
in some ways it feels like
00:30:06
you know you run a marathon
00:30:10
and you've just gotten you've got
00:30:11
nothing left
00:30:14
within the nhs and the challenges we've
00:30:17
been facing there are
00:30:19
burned out surgeons doctors nurses
00:30:22
medical students nursing students
00:30:24
receptionist porters
00:30:26
other healthcare professionals
00:30:30
if you had the opportunity and you do
00:30:32
what message would you give to them
00:30:34
given the current pandemic and and
00:30:37
perhaps really the whole healthcare
00:30:39
journey that we've all been on
00:30:41
it's just a message of gratitude and i'm
00:30:44
so in awe
00:30:47
of what they do
00:30:48
day in
00:30:49
day out i mean going out there and
00:30:52
helping others who are in need i mean it
00:30:56
sort of puts me to shame so to get home
00:31:01
what i would say to them is thank you
00:31:03
and
00:31:04
i hope you will get the pay rise that
00:31:07
you so so deserve
00:31:10
yes thank you so so much and thank you
00:31:12
so much for this wonderful interview i'm
00:31:14
so so grateful for all of your precious
00:31:16
time and i think we've generally had
00:31:18
some really wonderful stories that will
00:31:20
help so so many people which i have no
00:31:23
doubt so i'm so grateful to you well
00:31:25
thank you i enjoyed talking to you thank
00:31:27
you
00:31:32
[Music]
00:31:39
you
