Paul Bailey

The novelist Paul Bailey discusses writing in his ninth decade.

What does it mean to be creatively active for long enough to have a late style?

'Do not let me hear of the wisdom of old men', TS Eliot says, 'but rather of their folly'. Late Beethoven stared human extinction in the face and composed music of stark clarified beauty; late Rubens painted with a looser more sensuous brush stroke - was he remembering the flesh of his younger life or was his arthritis affecting his grip?

Late style for writer might include a maturation of style, a relaxing into the wisdom of age and experience, but it might also mean struggling to hold onto your gifts, and writing through illness and through grief.

Producer: Tim Dee

First broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in 2017.