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Clive James wistfully faces death, admitting he may not see Sydney again Clive James wistfully faces death, admitting he may not see Sydney again
(about 1 hour later)
The prolific writer and critic, Clive James, who has long guarded his family's privacy, has let it be known that he is losing his two-year struggle with leukaemia and may never see his native Sydney again. "I'm getting near the end; I'm a man who is approaching his terminus," he explained. The prolific writer and critic Clive James, who has long guarded his family's privacy, has let it be known that he is losing his two-year struggle with leukaemia and may never see his native Sydney again. "I'm getting near the end; I'm a man who is approaching his terminus," he said.
"I've been really ill for two-and-a-half years. I was diagnosed with leukaemia then I had COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) which is a fancy name for emphysema and my immune system packed up. And that's just the start. I almost died four times and I swore to myself if I can just get through this winter, I'd feel better. And I got through the winter and here it is a lovely sunny day and guess what, I don't feel better," said the author of at least 34 novels, long poems, collections of essays and criticism, five volumes of autobiography – and counting. "I've been really ill for two and a half years. I was diagnosed with leukaemia, then I had COPD [chronic obstructive pulmonary disease], which is a fancy name for emphysema, and my immune system packed up. And that's just the start. I almost died four times and I swore to myself if I can just get through this winter, I'd feel better. And I got through the winter and here it is a lovely sunny day and guess what, I don't feel better," said the author of at least 34 novels, long poems, collections of essays and criticism, five volumes of autobiography – and counting.
James, who is 72 and has lived in Britain for 50 years but has never abandoned his Australian passport, made his admission in an interview with BBC Radio 4's Meeting Myself Coming Back to be aired on Saturday night. James, who is 72 and has lived in Britain for 50 years but has never abandoned his Australian passport, was speaking in an interview with BBC Radio 4's Meeting Myself Coming Back to be aired on Saturday night.
Details of his remarks, made as he confronts archive footage from his long and combative career in print and on air, were published on Thursday and instantly disseminated by forms of media unimaginable when James first pioneered a new kind of highbrow TV criticism for the Observer in the 1970s. Details of his remarks, made as he watches archive footage from his long and combative career in print and on air, were published on Thursday and instantly disseminated by forms of media unimaginable when James first pioneered a new kind of highbrow TV criticism for the Observer in the 1970s.
A spokesman later downplayed the comments and said the interview had "sounded much less doom-laden than it does when transcribed", adding, "Clive is in fact in reasonable shape and is looking forward to years of working." A spokesman later downplayed the comments and said the interview had "sounded much less doom-laden than it does when transcribed", adding: "Clive is in fact in reasonable shape and is looking forward to years of working."
Formerly an 80-a-day smoker (he boasted of daily filling a hub cap with butts) and hard drinker, the critic with a string of popular TV talk shows to his name has been treated at Addenbrooke's hospital in Cambridge (his wife, Prue Shaw, is a university don) for B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukaemia as well as obstructive pulmonary disease. Formerly an 80-a-day smoker (he boasted of daily filling a hub cap with butts) and hard drinker, the critic with a string of popular TV talkshows to his name has been treated at Addenbrooke's hospital in Cambridge (his wife, Prue Shaw, is a university don) for B-cell chronic lymphocytic leukaemia as well as obstructive pulmonary disease.
"I've been so sick I'm not allowed to fly," he said. You couldn't get enough oxygen aboard a plane to get me to Sydney. I used to be in Australia for five or six times a year but now I can't go. The wistfulness is really building up and I'm facing the possibility I might never see Sydney again." "I've been so sick I'm not allowed to fly," he said. "You couldn't get enough oxygen aboard a plane to get me to Sydney. I used to be in Australia for five or six times a year but now I can't go. The wistfulness is really building up and I'm facing the possibility I might never see Sydney again."
A near contemporary of the art critic Robert Hughes, feminist and scholar Germaine Greer, and Richard Neville of the Oz obscenity trial, James was one of the clever young Australians – several associated with the leftwing sub-culture known as The Push at Sydney University – who headed for Britain in the early 60s when intellectuals were said to be treated like fugitives at home. Australia's famous "cultural cringe" of the 1950s was then still a vivid reality. A near contemporary of the art critic Robert Hughes, feminist and scholar Germaine Greer, and Richard Neville of the Oz obscenity trial, James was one of the clever young Australians – several associated with the leftwing subculture known as the Push at Sydney University – who headed for Britain in the early 1960s, when intellectuals were said to be treated like fugitives at home. Australia's famous "cultural cringe" of the 1950s was then still a vivid reality, unlike today.
A "child of the proletarian left" he remains a man of social democracy, but James's precise credo has been hard to pigeonhole. An atheist (religions are "advertising agencies for a product that doesn't exist") he has poured scorn on privatisation, especially whenever it threatens the BBC, expressed scepticism about climate change and supported the invasion of Iraq in 2003. The problem was not the brief Iraq war, but "the Iraq peace" that followed, he said. A "child of the proletarian left", he remains a man of social democracy, but James's precise credo has been hard to pigeonhole. An atheist (religions are "advertising agencies for a product that doesn't exist"), he has poured scorn on privatisation, especially whenever it threatens the BBC, expressed scepticism about climate change and supported the invasion of Iraq in 2003. The problem was not the brief Iraq war, but "the Iraq peace" that followed, he said.
In reflective mood, James told the BBC that his father may have held him only once before going off to war and surviving Japanese PoW camps, only to be killed in a plane crash coming home in 1945. "I suppose that was the defining effect on my life," he said. But being a war orphan was the key that unlocked his place at Sydney university – and Cambridge. In reflective mood, James told the BBC that his father may have held him only once before going off to war and surviving Japanese PoW camps, only to be killed in a plane crash coming home in 1945. "I suppose that was the defining effect on my life," he said. But being a war orphan was the key that unlocked his place at Sydney University – and Cambridge.