“A Fucking Waste of Time”: Noel Gallacher Does Not Mince His Words When It Comes to Literary Fiction

Noel Gallacher, looking unimpressed. Presumably with a book.

Quite what Noel Gallacher thinks he is doing when he sits down to pen lyrics for High Flying Birds is beyond me, but, according to the man himself, it certainly ain’t writing fiction.

Speaking to GQ’s Danny Wallace, Gallacher described fiction as “a fucking waste of time”, and as a way for “people who write and read and review books [to] fucking put themselves a tiny little bit above the rest of us”. This from a man who, in his day, could confidently count himself amongst the pantheon of great lyricists born out of the Manchester indie scene.

But Gallacher is obviously confused. Even as he sets about levelling his pot-shots at the world of literature he manages to betray his past as master song-crafter with some natty turns of phrase:

“You can substitute any word,” he says, discussing the esoteric nature of the titles read by Gallacher’s wife, something that has so obviously got the man’s goat.

“It's like a Rubik's Cube of shit titles - it'll be entitled 'The Incontinence Of Elephants'. And I'll say "What's that book about?" And she'll say, "Oh it's about a girl and this load of fucking nutters..." Right... so it's not about elephants, then? Why the fuck is it called 'The Incontinence Of Elephants'? Another one: 'The Tales Of The Clumsy Beekeeper'. What's that about? "Oh it's about the French Revolution."”

“A Rubik’s cube of shit titles”. The man is a genius, and I’m having that one for myself.

So am I going to set about exploding Noel Gallacher’s rather controversial theories about literary endeavours? Maybe I would have, but he does it himself later in the interview when Wallace asks him about his favourite film, Sergio Leone’s spaghetti western “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.”

“Well, you’ve presented me with a dilemma there,” he says, hopefully squirming in the plush leather wingback that they I imagine they provide for interviewees at GQ towers.

“I don’t want to have to invent the character Clint Eastwood plays, I just want to watch him.”

Fair enough.