Calendar An icon of a desk calendar. Cancel An icon of a circle with a diagonal line across. Caret An icon of a block arrow pointing to the right. Email An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of the Facebook "f" mark. Google An icon of the Google "G" mark. Linked In An icon of the Linked In "in" mark. Logout An icon representing logout. Profile An icon that resembles human head and shoulders. Telephone An icon of a traditional telephone receiver. Tick An icon of a tick mark. Is Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes. Is Not Public An icon of a human eye and eyelashes with a diagonal line through it. Pause Icon A two-lined pause icon for stopping interactions. Quote Mark A opening quote mark. Quote Mark A closing quote mark. Arrow An icon of an arrow. Folder An icon of a paper folder. Breaking An icon of an exclamation mark on a circular background. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Caret An icon of a caret arrow. Clock An icon of a clock face. Close An icon of the an X shape. Close Icon An icon used to represent where to interact to collapse or dismiss a component Comment An icon of a speech bubble. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Comments An icon of a speech bubble, denoting user comments. Ellipsis An icon of 3 horizontal dots. Envelope An icon of a paper envelope. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Camera An icon of a digital camera. Home An icon of a house. Instagram An icon of the Instagram logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. Magnifying Glass An icon of a magnifying glass. Search Icon A magnifying glass icon that is used to represent the function of searching. Menu An icon of 3 horizontal lines. Hamburger Menu Icon An icon used to represent a collapsed menu. Next An icon of an arrow pointing to the right. Notice An explanation mark centred inside a circle. Previous An icon of an arrow pointing to the left. Rating An icon of a star. Tag An icon of a tag. Twitter An icon of the Twitter logo. Video Camera An icon of a video camera shape. Speech Bubble Icon A icon displaying a speech bubble WhatsApp An icon of the WhatsApp logo. Information An icon of an information logo. Plus A mathematical 'plus' symbol. Duration An icon indicating Time. Success Tick An icon of a green tick. Success Tick Timeout An icon of a greyed out success tick. Loading Spinner An icon of a loading spinner. Facebook Messenger An icon of the facebook messenger app logo. Facebook An icon of a facebook f logo. Facebook Messenger An icon of the Twitter app logo. LinkedIn An icon of the LinkedIn logo. WhatsApp Messenger An icon of the Whatsapp messenger app logo. Email An icon of an mail envelope. Copy link A decentered black square over a white square.

Angus Peter Campbell: The older I get, the more I realise everything is made up – even money

Is literary fake news (with all its powers) any different really from political or any other fake news (with all their powers)?

Nobel Prize winner for literature, Kazuo Ishiguro (Image: Jim Ruymen/UPI/Shutterstock)
Nobel Prize winner for literature, Kazuo Ishiguro (Image: Jim Ruymen/UPI/Shutterstock)

I recently wrote an English-language novel titled Electricity which – thankfully – people seem to like.

I made it all up – not that bit, but everything in the book, because that’s what fiction is. A story. So, I made up the storyline, the characters, their thoughts and ideas, what they say and what happens to them. That’s what fiction does.

I mention it because I tuned into a talk recently from the great Nobel laureate Kazuo Ishiguro, which I enjoyed very much. He was Zooming, as we all are these days, from his living room, and it was refreshing to hear him. He used no grand literary terms, didn’t refer to any isms and was natural, engaging and funny. He’s married to a woman from Argyll, so that helps!

Three particular things he said have remained with me and given me food for thought. Basically, he thinks all writers (all human beings?) just tell the same story again and again and again. And again. All they do is change the characters and the setting. And every time he finishes a novel, he thinks: “That’s almost what I wanted to say. But not quite.” So, off we go again…

The second thing he said was that, though he was born in Japan, he moved with his family to Guildford in Surrey when he was five, and was brought up in England. Japan was a mostly-imagined country for him, and his first three novels were set in that barely-remembered land. They were all critically dismissed as dealing with “Japanese themes”, he said.

So, he deliberately included in his next novel (The Remains of the Day) the most English character – a butler in a posh English country house – but wrote it with exactly the same themes as his first three novels. And, suddenly, because the fiction was set in England, the themes were praised by critics as “universal”. Strange that, eh?

Is a novel any different to fake news?

The third thing he said was perhaps the most interesting and challenging. Because everything he writes is “made up”, he wonders whether that is in any way different to the things that others make up – Donald Trump and his followers, for example, or his populist imitators over here. Is literary fake news (with all its powers) any different really from political or any other fake news (with all their powers)?

It’s not that politics matters more than literature. The fiction at the heart of literature shapes our world every bit as much as the fictions at the heart of politics: The Great Gatsby and Sunset Song have shaped Scotland as much as (more than) any first minister. Somhairle MacGill-Eain still shapes the Gàidhealtachd more than Comhairle na Gàidhealtachd.

These days, bread from the supermarket must be bought, not bartered for (Image: successo images/Shutterstock)

The older I get, the more I realise that everything is made up. Money, for instance. I realise that if I’m going to the local Co-op for a loaf of bread, I need to pay for it. And that money, in that sense, has real exchange value. But where does it come from in the first place?

Without diving deep into Marx’s labour theory of value or John Maynard Keynes’s aggregate demand, here’s a simpleton’s guide to it (which may partially explain why I am poorer now than I was decades ago).

There is always money for friends in high places and war

I quite like reading Richard Murphy, who blogs under Funding the Future. Mr Murphy is a professor of accounting at Sheffield University Management School, and a chartered accountant, so probably knows that two plus two usually makes four. Here’s what he says:

“Let’s start at the very beginning. A person goes into a bank and asks for a £1,000 loan. The bank checks them out, and agrees. And that is all that it takes to create new money.

“Money is just a promise to pay. That simple exchange of promises is all it takes to create it. Two promises. Two accounts. And as a result we get new money. That is how all money is created. It is as simple as that.

“There is no one else’s money involved in this process. The bank does not lend out the money saved with them. And there are no notes and coin moved from one pile to another pile to back this all up either. There are just two promises. And then there is new money.”

And he’s not the only one to question the falsity of comparing the state’s sporran to yours and mine. They are two completely different things, as the economist Professor Mariana Mazzucato also argues.

For, when we borrow money, we borrow it from someone. When the government borrows money, it borrows from itself. Its own magic money tree, as it were: look how money is always available when it comes to handing it out to their friends, or for waging war.

It’s all made up, as Donald John the half-Leòdhasach said all along!


Angus Peter Campbell is an award-winning writer and actor from Uist

Conversation