Books

Autocrats Of The Talking Table

As with any book one really enjoys, I have some small quibbles, but the book still makes delicious reading.

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Autocrats Of The Talking Table
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According to journalistic legend, one day in 1994, Max Wilkinson, editor of the Financial Times’s weekend edition, was approached by a PR man to do a series of sponsored celebrity interviews that would artfully weave in a mention of a newly launched car. Wilkinson, naturally, squelched the idea. But, the legend goes, the germ of that thought led, laterally, to the idea of a series of themed interviews, which became Lunch With the FT—now one of the FT’s most-read columns, along with the famous backpage Lex column. This delightful book is a collection of 52 of the best of those interviews.

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Thus we have everybody from Donald Rumsfeld to Angelina Jolie, from George Soros to Imran Khan, from economist Paul Krugman to Albert Underzo, co-creator of the Asterix comics. There’s even Saif Gaddafi, the doctoral student son of the former Libyan dictator Muammar Gaddafi (though one wonders what wicked thought process led to him being invited). These personalities are drawn into conversation by the FT’s interviewers over a leisurely meal at any restaurant of their choice, accompanied by a bottle—or two—of wine, which, of course, is a wonderful device to get them to drop their formal persona, and reveal a little more of themselves than they otherwise would have.

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Picture this. Fashion designers Dolce and Gabbana, in their interview, talk, among other things, about how they’ve been business partners for over thirty years, but no longer have sex with each other. Albert Underzo talks about the publisher’s brief for the first Asterix book: ‘a cartoon book for children, drawing on French culture and history’. Michael Caine talks of his 1967 film, Billion Dollar Brain, which featured a remarkably prescient version of the Internet, an idea that everybody ridiculed at the time. Mo Ibrahim, the Sudanese telecom pioneer, talks about his ingenious political reform initiative that offers $5 million a year to African leaders who step down gracefully and hand over to an elected successor. Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak behaves, poignantly, like an ageing rock star, recounting his glory days in endless, mind-numbing detail. And poet Gavin Ewart, poor man, drank three Negronis and two bottles of Rully, ran up a three-figure bill, then went home from the interview and dropped dead.

The restaurants, meanwhile, tell a story by themselves. They are usually unabashedly ritzy—like Scottish cycl­ing champion David Millar’s choice of, well, Scott’s in London, where the bill came to a gargantuan £270, and French businessman Henri de Castries’s choice of the Laurent in Paris, where the bill came to 410 euros. But, on the other hand, there’s Imran Khan’s favourite little kabab joint in Islamabad, where the bill added up to just 250 rupees (plus a generous tip).

One lovely touch is the bill that accompanies the interviews, visually telegraphing what the worthies ate and how much it came to, adding a small voyeuristic pleasure to one’s enjoyment of the piece. Thus we learn, for example, that former South African president F.W. de Klerk’s choice, at Cape Town’s Aubergine restaurant, was springbok carpaccio, salmon with a Mediterranean crust, duck breast, a glass of red wine and espresso (bill for two: R 600, or £49), while Saudi billionaire investor, Prince Al Waleed, ordered a rucola-and-tomato salad and a Pepsi One at George V Hotel in Paris (bill for two: £136). Most intriguing, though, is the bill for the interview of Zimbabwean politician, Morgan Tsva­n­girai: one Coke: $1, one Sprite: $1; one ticket, London-Harare-London: £950.

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As with any book one really enjoys, I have some small quibbles. I’m not sure I entirely agree with the choice of interviews: I would have certainly included Bill Gates’s 2010 interview, for example, where (over an all-American cheeseburger lunch) he talked about his radical ideas on philanthropy. Also, I wish Lionel Barber’s introductory piece, telling the back story of the series, had been more substantial and revealing: it would have made such fascinating reading. But most of all, I wish they had included the date of each interview, which would have allowed the reader to place it in the context of its time, instead of racking one’s brain to figure out whether whatever-it-was was said in 1994 or 2004 or 2012 (it would have made such a difference). Never mind, the book still makes delicious reading. I hope it’s just the first in a series: after all, they have approximately 750 more Lunch With the FT interviews left to choose from.

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