Breaking the ice

John Banville doesn’t do small talk. His greeting when we meet in the bar of the Merrion Hotel is perfunctory, his exit an hour and a half later disconcertingly abrupt.

John Banville doesn’t do small talk. His greeting when we meet in the bar of the Merrion Hotel is perfunctory, his exit an hour and a half later disconcertingly abrupt. If he hadn’t been such a genial, erudite and consistently amusing companion in between, I might almost have been offended.

The 60-year-old novelist is, in his own words, ‘‘a cold bastard’’ who despises popular culture, is perpetually pained by the stupidity of people ...