Iain Banks

Iain Banks
Born Iain Banks
16 February 1954 (1954-02-16) (age 56)
Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland
Pen name Iain M. Banks
Occupation writer
Nationality Scottish
Period 1984–
Genres science fiction
literary fiction
iainbanks.net

Iain Banks (born on 16 February 1954 in Dunfermline, Fife) is a Scottish writer. He writes mainstream fiction under Iain Banks, and science fiction as Iain M. Banks, including the initial of his adopted middle name Menzies. In 2008, The Times named Banks in their list of "The 50 greatest British writers since 1945".[1]

Contents

Early life and education

Banks's father was an officer in the Admiralty and his mother was a professional ice skater. Banks studied English, philosophy, and psychology at the University of Stirling.

Personal life

After attending the University of Stirling, Banks moved to London and lived in the south of England until 1988 when he returned to Scotland, living in Edinburgh and then Fife.[2]

Banks met his wife Annie in London, before the release of his first book. They married in Hawaii in 1992.[3] It was announced in early 2007 that, after 15 years together, they had separated.[4] Annie died in 2009, two months after their divorce had become final.[5] Banks currently lives in North Queensferry, a town on the north side of the Firth of Forth, with the published author and founder of the Dead by Dawn film festival Adèle Hartley.[3] The two have been together since 2006, a few months after Banks and his wife formally separated.[5]

In February 2007, Banks sold his extensive car collection, including a 3.2 litre Porsche Boxster, a Porsche 911 Turbo, a 3.8 litre Jaguar Mark II, a 5 litre BMW M5 and a daily use diesel Land Rover Defender whose power he had boosted by about 50%. Banks traded all of the vehicles for a Lexus RX 400h hybrid - since replaced by a diesel Toyota Yaris - and vowed in the future to fly only in emergencies.[6]

While interested in technology, he is reluctant to use the Internet or email, though he likes some PC computer games, including Civilization which provided minor inspiration to his stories.

Politics

A strong awareness of left-wing history shows in his writings. The argument that an economy of abundance renders anarchy and adhocracy viable (or even inevitable) attracts many as an interesting potential experiment, were it ever to become testable. He was a signatory to the Declaration of Calton Hill, which calls for Scottish independence.[7]

In late 2004, Banks was a member of a group of British politicians and media figures who campaigned to have Prime Minister Tony Blair impeached following the 2003 invasion of Iraq. In protest he cut up his passport and posted it to 10 Downing Street. In an interview in Socialist Review he claimed he did this after he "abandoned the idea of crashing my Land Rover through the gates of Fife dockyard, after spotting the guys armed with machine guns."[8] He relates his concerns about the invasion of Iraq in his book Raw Spirit, and the principal protagonist (Alban McGill) in the novel The Steep Approach to Garbadale confronts another character with arguments in a similar vein.

Banks is an Honorary Associate of the National Secular Society (see Quotations) and a Distinguished Supporter of the Humanist Society of Scotland.

Names

Interviewed on Mark Lawson's BBC Four series, first broadcast in the UK on 14 November 2006, Banks explained why his novels are published under two different names. His parents wished to name him Iain Menzies Banks but his father made a mistake when registering the birth and he was officially registered as Iain Banks. Despite this he continued to use his middle name, and it may be considered official by adoption. It was as Iain M. Banks that he submitted The Wasp Factory for publication, however his editor asked if he would mind dropping the 'M' as it appeared "too fussy". The editor also raised concerns about possible confusion with Rosie M. Banks, a minor romantic novelist in P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves novels. Following his three mainstream novels, his publishers agreed to publish his first SF novel, Consider Phlebas. To distinguish between the mainstream and SF novels, Banks suggested the return of the 'M'.

Bibliography

Novels as Iain Banks

Fiction as Iain M. Banks

Novels

The Culture novels
Other novels

Short fiction collections

The fiction includes three short works set in the Culture universe. It also includes works of fiction more characteristic of Banks' writing published as Iain M. Banks.

Non-fiction

Introductions

Banks has written a number of introductions for works by other writers including:

Contributions

Banks has contributed to a number of publications, including:

He was a semi-regular music reviewer for Marc Riley's Rocket Science radio show on BBC 6 Music. He was the subject of a South Bank Show television programme broadcast on 16 November 1997, subtitled The Strange Worlds of Iain Banks, which concentrated on his mainstream work. The Curse Of Iain Banks, a play written by Maxton Walker, was performed at the Edinburgh Fringe in 1999, with Banks contributing as a voice on tape. He has appeared on the BBC's political discussion television programme Question Time.

At the beginning of 2006 Banks captained a team of writers to victory in a special series of University Challenge on BBC2, beating a team of actors 185-105 (1 January 2006), and then the 'news' team 190-45 in the final (2 January 2006). He also won an edition of Celebrity Mastermind, taking "Malt whisky & the distilleries of Scotland" as his specialist subject on BBC1 on 2 January 2006.

Quotes

References

  1. ↑ The 50 greatest British writers since 1945. 5 January 2008. The Times. Retrieved on 2010-02-20.
  2. ↑ Banks, Iain (2003). Raw Spirit: In Search of the Perfect Dram. London: Century. ISBN 978-1844131952. 
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 Stuart Jeffries, A man of culture, The Guardian, 25 May 2007
  4. ↑ Liz Hoggard (18 February 2007). "Iain Banks: The novel factory". Independent. http://news.independent.co.uk/people/profiles/article2281403.ece. 
  5. ↑ 5.0 5.1 Interview by Edi Stark for Stark Talk, BBC Radio Scotland, 19 May 2010
  6. ↑ Mark Macaskill and Robert Booth (25 February 2007). "Bye-bye Porsches, says green convert Iain Banks". London: Times. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article1434667.ece. 
  7. ↑ The Scottish Socialist Party "Rallying for a Republic", 9 October 2004
  8. ↑ Socialist Review "Changing society, imagining the future", February 2008
  9. ↑ http://www.littlebrown.co.uk/Title/9781841498935
  10. ↑ New Scientist letter 19 November 2005
  11. ↑ Contemporary writers
  12. ↑ Secularism.org.uk
  13. ↑ Banks interview at CNN, 15 May 2008

External links

Interviews

Iain Banks books
As Iain Banks
The Wasp Factory · Walking on Glass · The Bridge · Espedair Street · Canal Dreams · The Crow Road · Complicity · Whit · A Song of Stone · The Business · Dead Air · Raw Spirit · The Steep Approach to Garbadale · Transition
As Iain M. Banks
Consider Phlebas · The Player of Games · Use of Weapons · The State of the Art · Against a Dark Background · Feersum Endjinn · Excession · Inversions · Look to Windward · The Algebraist · Matter · Surface Detail