Anthony Horowitz addressed the Oxford Union on 5th June 2007. Dani Compton was there to report for Write Away:

Who’s the most interesting, the hero or the villain? According to Anthony Horowitz, it is not the hero that inspires but the Miss Havershams, Uriah Heapes and Hannibal Lectors that define books: “People love being bad” and these characters fulfil something on our behalf. Horowitz goes as far as starting with the baddie and the hideous way in which they will meet their demise before reaching any further decisions regarding the plot!

However, in an insightful and thought-provoking talk, the author of the Alex Rider novels pondered over the fact that creating these personifications of evil is becoming harder in the post-Berlin Wall, post-9/11 litigious society that we live in. The KGB villains of Ian Fleming are no longer as acceptable as they once were and despite defining the racial stereotype as “the great sin in literature”, Horowitz purposefully makes use of what he terms ‘innocent racism’. All of the villains in the Alex Rider novels are potential points of controversy from Lebanese Herod Sayle to the pre-apartheid South African, Dr Grief in Point Blanc. But Horowitz is far from apologetic, despite agreeing to change the character of Herod Sayle for the film adaptation of Stormbreaker in response to a refusal from the film company to accommodate a middle-eastern villain. His notion that racism is a ‘thought-blocker’ that limits real debate and discussion was a key point in his talk that encompassed not only racism, but politics, media political correctness and civil liberties.

Despite focusing on the difficulties posed by the villain, Horowitz finished on a more positive note, placing the future in the hands of his young audience, in whom he has utter faith and for whom his hero, Alex Rider, is a continued source of inspiration.

Report by Dani Compton

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