Tunes of Numpties: Scottish novelists on independence

There are many ways to commission fat-headed political analysis but, in my experience, by far the easiest is to ask a novelist his (or her) opinion on the great issues of the day. Better still, ask several. That way you can be sure you’ll get something even the student version of the Socialist Worker might think twice before publishing.

There are, of course, exceptions. Some of them quite close to home, in my view. Nevertheless (as Miss Spark so often said) the general rule applies: asking writers for their views on politics is no more useful or sensible than asking gravediggers or sheep shearers their opinion. It may be interesting; it is not likely to be valuable. Or, to put it more kindly, expertise in writing fiction does not necessarily translate into expertise in analysing politics. And why should it? They are different skills and there’s no reason to suppose novelists any less mental than the average zoomer chosen by lottery.