Book Reviews
Hold the front page! This is what the papers say. If you’ve come across anything else, please let us know. Apologies for the lack of radio interview sound bytes – coming soon!
Daily Echo (Bournemouth)
25 October 2005
Delivering the male
Two authors will be speaking the unspeakable this week. Nick Churchill lends an ear…
Slugs and snails and puppy dog tails… We all know what little boys are made of, but what about the men they become?
A decidedly unconventional book reading event at Borders in Bournemouth Square will attempt to unravel the make-up of the common man tomorrow from 7pm when Mickey Elias and Ed Seeker share passages from their new book “MEN Speak the Unspeakable”.
The book – apparently the first to carry an 18 Certificate – is a series of transcriptions of taped conversations between Mickey and Ed in which they talk about their maleness, why they are the way they are and how they’ve come to their conclusions.
They discuss – often in brutally frank terms – all manner of issues. The very things that blokes aren’t supposed to talk about.
“Men are brought up to say they’re alright, make do, get on with things, but all that does is create blockages or addictions to hide behind,” says Mickey.
“Unless we can claim our masculinity, take responsibility for it and move on, we are destined to repeat negative characteristics that will ultimately make us ill. Far more men die of cancer than women, for instance.
“The readings make interesting events as we get other people to take part – especially when a woman reads a passage about her penis.
“All we’re doing is talking about ourselves, we’re not telling people how to live their lives like a self-help book, although it is broadly about personal development. A lot of it is actually really funny, especially when read aloud, and if people go away and think a bit about their own lives then maybe we’ll have succeeded in some small way and made a difference.”
The book came about as both Mickey, 41, and Ed, 40, felt that had reached a kind of crossroads in their lives. Both wanted more and felt they had outgrown the roles to which they had previously adhered.
“It started in our late 30’s with a feeling of having had enough of blagging our way through life, it felt like going through a late adolescence.
“We both wanted more as life had become too narrow. Ed said he was coming over one day and I asked him to stop on the way and buy a Dictaphone as I had a feeling we could talk a book and it grew from there to the extent that by the time we came to transcribe the tapes we didn’t have a clue what was on them,” says Mickey.
“I work as a therapist and I was very aware of the way that the secrets and shames of my clients continued to block their lives so I was keen to explore my own and, ultimately, get over them.
“Both Ed and I come from families where aggression was frowned upon but the whole family was based around passive aggression. We were both the victims of passive aggression, Mummy’s boys.
“I’ve had a 69-year-old man in the US contact me to say the book had changed his life in that he could be at ease with his son and not be scared of his grandchildren.
“A 30-year-old man from Devon got in touch to say he had realised he could walk a spiritual path and be a good person, but also take his masculinity with him.
“In this age men are expected to make things okay, put things right, do what’s best, but what we’re not always allowed to be is men. We’re blokes and there’s nothing wrong with that.”
All very true, but it’s a big step from acknowledging that to confessing the kind of intimate details that Mickey and Ed do in the book.
Equally, however far from the reader’s personal experience their stories may be, there is a universality about what’s being said.
“Listen, I thought I could be effectively committing suicide writing this book,” says Mickey.
“Men fear losing their partners, alienating their kids, being ostracised at work or dropped by their friends – that’s why we don’t talk about this stuff. But until we do it will always be in our way.
“I am completely in love at the moment, but I’ve been amazed at how much of a babe magnet the book has become.
“Women like men who are in touch with their maleness and understand it.”
As well as a talking book version of “MEN Speak the Unspeakable”, Mickey and Ed* are planning more specific books on bully boys turning into men and bad boys turning into men.
*Mickey intends to do ‘bully boy’ with Lui, and ‘bad boy’ with John, two other men discussed in the book.