Nury Vittachi on journalism, death and the irrational mind

At a primary school, a buoyant teacher coos to a neatly-arranged square of cross-legged children: "Does anybody know anything about Nury Vittachi?" A few little hands go up, fingers splayed and straining. The answers come in fast.

"He writes books."

"And poems."

"He's in the newspaper sometimes."

"He’s Sam Jam … sometimes."

This is a simple and not inaccurate introduction of Vittachi. The kids know and love him as the author of childrens' books, under the pseudonym Sam Jam, while adults know Vittachi as the outspoken newspaper columnist and a happy paladin of Asian writers. Vittachi set up the Asia Literary Review in Hong Kong several years ago, giving English-language writing in the region a much-needed showcase. The Review has grown to become "Asia's Granta."

Now Vittachi devotes most of his time to the production of childrens' books, such as his latest release "May Moon Fixes the World Economy," and hopes to encourage more kids to appreciate reading. We spoke to Vittachi at Kennedy School in Pok Fu Lam where Vittachi gave a speech to the students about where stories come from.   

CNNGo: You’ve been accused more than once of being "aloof and unmanageable" as a journalist. Would you care to defend yourself?

Not really. Journalists tend to be quite social -- they go out drinking a lot, they like long lunches and all that. And I was always obsessed with producing books and things. So whereas everybody was going out for lunch, I was saying, "Right, I've finished this column, now I’m going to write this book." So it's true, I never socialized. As for "unmanageable," I was always in trouble. At one stage I was averaging one lawsuit -- well, legal letter at least -- every 90 days or so. [Just for] poking fun at people in my column.

CNNGo: The current decline of traditional media -- what’s your take?

I’m very excited about it. I think it’s going through a healthy evolution. Put it this way: it’s great for writers; it’s tricky for the accountants.

It wasn’t that long ago when a colleague I worked with used to take pictures [of the war in Vietnam], hide them in his underpants, swim across the Gulf of Vietnam, deliver them in a packet to an office in Bangkok, which would fly them to Hong Kong. And they would be broadcast to the world. And that's how you took news pictures in the 1970s. It's all gotten so much easier for us. We can send our work out to so many different outlets.

CNNGo: Still, there are writers in the West who are screaming doomsday for the newspaper industry. Are we dealing with the challenges differently in Asia?

Oh, yes. In Asia, probably 80 percent of the individuals don’t have an Internet connection. In Hong Kong, South Korea and Japan, [connectivity] is very high. In other Asian countries, it’s very low. So newspaper readership is far ahead of Internet readership. The circulation of a newspaper in Japan is in the millions. Same in India, and they’re growing fast. So in fact, if you average out all the newspaper readers in the world, including Asia, you’ll find that the newspaper readership of the planet is increasing, still.

CNNGo: And you have a very popular blog www.mrjam.org.

It’s actually a syndicated column, written for the newspapers. [The Standard prints it in Hong Kong]. I’m very big in Bangladesh, which is funny. I’ve never even thought about Bangladesh, but they print it every day there. So the column goes to all these newspapers first, and then a day or so later it bounces to the website.

CNNGo: You’re the founding editor of the "Asia Literary Review". Has it been successful?

Yes. That’s an amazing story. There’s a famous literary magazine called "Granta". Salman Rushdie, Martin Amis and all these superstar writers came to fame through Granta. Anyway, it ran out of money about five years ago. Lots of people tried to buy it, including a banker from Hong Kong. He was outbid at the last minute. And he was licking his wounds. So he took over my tiny little magazine, printed in my bedroom here. Then, he found out that the editor of "Granta" wanted a change. So [this banker] hired him to be the consulting editor for the "Asia Literary Review"! So it went from being the pretend copy of "Granta" to being, sort of, the real "Granta".

CNNGo: Have you seen any potential literary lights through the Review?

Yes, definitely. The next John Grisham is going to be Asian. It’s just the law of averages. Over 60 percent of the world's population lives in Asia, and almost 100 percent of the world's bestselling books are from America and Europe. Therefore, the next bestseller has to be from this side of the world. So we're looking for that writer. It's just a matter of time. 

CNNGo: You told the kids at Kennedy School that becoming a writer would make them rich and famous. You’ve also said that you’d encourage young writers to get a "proper job" first. Which do you believe?

I feel that creative jobs work better if you have a bit of financial security, especially in Hong Kong, where people are money minded. If I go out and tell kids "yes, be creative," the teachers will hate me, the parents will hate me. The kids will love me, but you’ve got to be honest here. Creative things have to start as hobbies, and then they become your day job. 

CNNGo: What do you make of the hysteria surrounding the Twilight series and, less recently, the Harry Potter books?

I think it’s great -- anything that gets kids to pick up a book. Parents often come to me for reading advice and I say, send them into the bookshop and tell them they can have any book they like. They’ll go in and choose a book like Pokemon or something. But they’ll read it. It is good for them. Imagination is terribly underrated.

There’s a recent piece of psychological research, which got me excited. Psychologists have discovered that the biggest challenges humans face are dealing with death, love, and loss. None of these three things can be dealt with by the rational mind. They can only be dealt with by the irrational mind.

That’s why people who are slightly wacky, or religious, cope with these big things much better than scientists do. For years we’ve been saying, "Be more rational, be more practical, be more scientific." And now we’re saying, "No, hang on a minute. Let’s be a bit sillier. Let’s think about faith and belief." Seeing things that we’re not meant to see is actually what we’re supposed to do.

CNNGo: You write often about the absurdities of life in Hong Kong. What are some of the city’s greatest and worst idiosyncrasies?

You know, at one stage, the top selling pizza toppings were fruit salad, and curried octopus and pineapple. I think the current top seller is tuna and mayonnaise. So that’s joyfully absurd. As for the worst, I don’t know, I’m an unreserved Hong Kong fan.

 
Nury Vittachi’s latest book, "May Moon Fixes the World Economy", is now available at Bookazine and Dymocks.