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The Process
is the Product

“This is my favourite writing desk. When I write here,
I don’t care what I write. Just that I’m writing.”

 
 

DCR James

 
 

Author, consultant, political activist

DCR James first studied failure without ever really intending to at New College, Oxford University under the expert eye of tutor Craig Raine who, it later turned out, was himself writing a massively unsuccessful first novel at the time.

After flirting with bankruptcy at the college bar, DCR managed to get some of his uni money back from his bank in the form of returned bank charges, going on to write about it in one of the least sexy songs to ever be played on Radio 1 and make it into the charts called “I fought the Lloyds”.

This little taste of success, (perhaps it was the sneer from Jeremy Paxman as he played out Newsnight with the song that did it), spurred DCR on to waste the next five years of his life trying to write a ‘serious’ pop song, get to number one and get out of debt again. It didn’t happen.

Luckily he took to hanging out in museums as they had free wifi. At the IWM in London, a chance encounter led to a commission to write two books about the world wars - a subject that as a literature student, he knew absolutely nothing about. The books were - eventually well received - but in order to hide the fact that he knew nothing about the world wars he had to do an awful lot of research and despite the joy of being paid to become a published author, his bank account was again heading in the wrong direction. Working out his hourly rate it came to about £2.55 an hour, which probably would have been decent if they’d been news reports written at the time and not history books written 70 years later.

Those who can, do - and those who could, but are broke as fuck, should get themselves a job teaching. Not a school obviously, as that won’t ever pay off an overdraft. No, the next few years took him to a wealth of glamorous places in order to teach the children of some of the most influential families in the world. The pay almost outpaced the guilt - until it didn’t. Workshops in youth centres, detention centres and prisons followed, somewhat assuaging the soul, but unfortunately reigniting the love of music and leading to a reformation of the ageing ska band, with no more top tens, but gradually growing hair and some impressive sounding gigs at Glastonbury, Secret Garden, Shambhala and, weirdly, the Houses of Parliament where Uri Geller bent a silver spoon for the band and they smuggled it out in a trombone case. Despite this, nothing ever got close to the surrealism of supporting Chaz and Dave in their local New Cross, particularly as they came backstage after for a bit of a rabbit.

Then the crisis-at-30 hit - around about the age of 30 - and it became more and more obvious that it was becoming difficult to keep up with the new more sophisticated tastes of maturing friends without a similar change in life circumstances (pink Himalayan sea salt, kitchen roll in the kitchen, proper jobs). So he bunked down, watch 8 straight series of The Apprentice and got a string of actual jobs.

Moving to France, he took the reigns at the family vineyard, soon becoming the director of sales after a surprisingly non-gruelling interview process. 5 years and the world’s first documentary novel later, he’d learnt how to sell things online, led over 1000 tastings and opened an art gallery on the side.

On successfully selling the vineyard, he moved up to the hills and launched Le Santé Writer’s Retreat where the world’s first ever Thinking Garden festival was hosted in 2017. This was great. But another one of those bankruptcy-flavoured types of great. So back out of premature retirement a year later, he was heading off to a country that shall remain nameless to head their digital communications team. It took a few months to realise that digital communications is the new name for propaganda. So after setting up a youth movement of entrepreneurs instead of spreading fake news, and falling a little bit in love with the country that shall remain nameless, he was back to London where in the meantime a friend had decided to start a bank.

7 months working in a bank and strangely enough… once again the blank page was beckoning.

The Artist’s Guide to NOT growing up was completed in 2019 back up in the hills at my favourite writing desk at Le Santé Writer’s Retreat.

Preorder “The Artist’s Guide to NOT growing up”

 

Books

  • The Artist’s Guide to NOT growing up

  • Posters and Propaganda

  • My First World War

  • My Second World War

Music

Poetry

proper jobs