The genius of Quentin Tarantino

During one of the interminable lockdowns I mentioned that I didn’t care if I never went to another launch party again. Not only did I say it, I think I wrote it. Well, that will learn me, as my mum used to say. The launch for Julie Bindel’s book Feminism for Women was held in Conway Hall and it was anything but the usual turps and vol-au-vent affair. Bindel is a polarising figure and a fabulous friend. What’s really polarising about her, I think, is that she doesn’t pose on Instagram in ‘Smash the patriarchy’ T-shirts — she actively does feminism. It was an enormous relief to hear her say that the things that make men feel better — pole dancing, surrogacy, sex work — are not feminism. It was particularly uplifting because it is currently controversial to put women at the centre of our own liberation movement, and because the publishing industry is peopled by wusses who have never fought for a thing in their lives but get ‘hurty feelings’ if the women who have speak up.

My youngest is a film buff, so the next day we went off to see director Quentin Tarantino speak about turning his film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood into a novel. I wanted him to talk about Harvey Weinstein, foot fetishism and Uma Thurman. You can’t always get what you want. Interviewing Tarantino was Kim Newman, critic, horror writer, film obsessive. They were in nerd heaven. They could have been two guys talking about stamps or carburettors. Then Tarantino read from his novel and his genius for dialogue was immediately clear, just superb: the swearing and the pacing of the swearing. That’s art. The passage he read was all about Cliff (Brad Pitt’s character in the movie) thinking about being a pimp but realising it was too much like hard work to sleep with all these women.