Nicola Barker - Burley Cross Postbox Theft

F***ing sympathetic?!

What absolute, bloody b*lls**t!

[ FKN blows his nose, forcefully]

I mean is Bob Dylan sympathetic, Troy? Is Jerry Lee Lewis sympathetic? Is Little Richard sympathetic? Is Neil Young sympathetic? Is Janis Joplin sympathetic? Is Frank Zappa sympathetic? Is Captain Beefheart sympathetic?

Well?!

[ Suspenseful pause]

OF COURSE THEY F***ING AREN’T!

THEY’RE F***ING ARTISTS FOR CHRIST’S SAKE!! GENIUS DOEN’T DEMAND SYMPATHY, TROY! IT

DEMANDS RESPECT! RESPECT !!

UNDERSTAND?!

[ Interlude of quiet panting, enlivened by a small fart]

And this isn’t even the half of it, Troy!

I’ve barely scraped the surface, yet!

Just listen to…

[Scuffling of piece of paper, throat clearing, re-adoption of nasal whine… ]

‘Of course he would then invariably go off on one of his typical, ten-minute rants about how Bob Dylan wasn’t ‘sympathetic’ (because he was a poet and therefore didn’t need to be) and I was then obliged to have to try and explain to him — in the kindest possible way — that a couple of novelty hits in the nineties, a catchy nickname, a scandalous private life and a green straw hat do not — I repeat, do not — a Bob Dylan make.

‘I mean, if the producers of Britain’s most brilliant and long-running comedy sit-com hadn’t used one of Nebraska’s songs for its theme tune five years ago (and purely out of a sense of irony, to boot!), then that huge American Emo band hadn’t done the dreadful cover version of it which was then promptly snapped up by those tone-deaf film people — he’d be pretty much on his uppers right now and there wouldn’t be a musical career, or an autobiography for that matter!’

Good GOD , Troy! D’you hear that?! The unbridled cheek of the little c**t! ‘Green straw hat?!’ I haven’t even worn the hat since 1999! I ditched it for the Millennium. I burned it, live, onstage, at that pub in Bedford! The Little Wren died that night — he was immolated that night, Troy, and Frank K. Nebraska arose, phoenix-like, from the ashes (you were there, Troy, as I recall. You had to pay off the fire department).

A legendary moment in my career, Troy! A critical moment in my career! A turning point! The cuddly and lovable Little Wren — Great Britain’s favourite tabloid cheeky-chappie — commits public seppuku so that the Nietzschean Superman, the sleek, intellectual monolith that is Frank K. Nebraska, can finally come bursting into life!

Yet how many pages does this astonishing turn of events warrant in the book, Troy? How many?! Three! Three piddling pages! Pole gives at least as many pages to that insignificant episode at The Royal Variety Performance where I was arrested and sectioned for trying to hand the Queen a secret message about f***ing radishes! It was a message about radishes , Troy! Utterly insignificant! Ludicrously over-mediated at the time! Has no bearing at all on my creative output! In fact I actively avoided mentioning the stupid interlude in our discussions because I didn’t want it featuring too prominently in the book.

And for the record — the hat wasn’t f***ing straw, it was felt! It was f***ing felt! A felt hat! My infamous green felt hat, for f**k’s sake! And the arrogant slime-ball calls himself a ‘professional’?!

Huh?!

[Yet more nasal whine] ‘I also told him that there needed to be a sense that the subject of the book had been on a “journey” of some kind (a cliché, I know, but the arc of the narrative usually demands it), and that his “experiences” had taught him something valuable — about both himself and the world he inhabits. Unfortunately, in the case of Mr Nebraska, they hadn’t, so once again I was obliged to…’

A journey , Troy! The little pri*k wants a journey? I’ll give him a f***ing journey all right! I’ll give him a swift kick up the arse all the way down to his local Accident and Emergency! That’s what I’ll give him! I’ll give his winking anus a journey it’ll never forget into deepest recesses of his strangulated throat!

[ FKN readopts nasal voice]

‘One of the major problems with our sessions was that Mr Nebraska cancelled most of them, and refused to reschedule, preferring to tape his “recollections” on that infernal malfunctioning Dictaphone of his, which seems to record his voice at twice the normal speed and makes any benighted soul lumbered with the task of deciphering it feel like they’re listening to the hyperactive rantings of a foul-mouthed, deeply demonic Pinky or Perky…’

[This is absolutely true, Sergeant Everill — H.G.]

What guff , Troy! What arrant, f***ing bull***t! Is the fool on acid or something?! Is he hallucinating?! Something wrong with my Dictaphone?

Boll**ks!

He was just smarting , because by deftly employing my handy Dictaphone I cunningly redirected the course of the narrative! I excluded him from the creative process! His fragile ego simply couldn’t handle it!

[FKN commences reading again]

‘A major downside of Mr Nebraska’s refusal to see me in person — and answer my many questions about his life — was the fact that it allowed him to avoid interrogating his past (his “history”) with anything amounting to a critical — or dispassionate — eye. This rendered him wholly incapable of seeing any of the situations in his car crash of a personal life from any other perspective apart from his own. To “bulk out” the details of these segments of his life (the “missing years” between 1989 and 1996 being a case in point) I was often obliged to mine other sources.

‘Mr Nebraska has that rare and wonderful ability to be completely self-involved and yet not remotely self-aware (quite incredible, really, when you consider how many idle hours he’s frittered away in rehab over the years) …’

[Long pause]

So that’s how he came up with the section about my mother’s early vaudeville career, Troy! And the whole chapter about the cottage in Aylesbury I shared with Luella! I wondered how he managed to get all that detail about the blue Dalton crockery she kept arranged on her old dresser… I thought he’d just made it up and struck lucky!

God! The little sneak actually spoke to Luella?

Well, no wonder I’m so nice about the thieving cow in the book!

Now it all makes sense!

How many other of my exes did he buddy-up to?

[Shocked pause]

Holy f**k! He contacted Mel! He visited the asylum! That’s how he knew it was a teapot I threw at her when she told me she was up the f***ing duff again in ’89, and not a slice of parkin!

Christ!

And all the pointless filler he put in there about my sister’s kleptomania, and how her relentless shoplifting as a kid got us all put into care… And Anthony’s breech birth in the back of my Reliant Robin… And how I originally got the ‘Wren’ moniker from a barman in Llandudno…

He f***ing researched all this rubbish behind my back?! Without even telling me?! The sneaky, conniving, two-faced, little c**t! I knew it! I knew he couldn’t be trusted, Troy! My instincts were right all along! My instincts were spot-on!

I mean I told you how I didn’t want some jumped-up little nobody, some hack , putting his mark all over my life… [More straining]