Paula Byrne: evaluation

Transcript context

…Now, if I had known of this at the time, I would’ve inferred that you were a nonconformist and, in some way, some mix of quite interesting and ambitious, and wanted to meet you. Did other people in England react that way? Did you become a heroine, or did they just assume the letters were somehow some correct critique of you? Oh, I don’t think I was a heroine at all. I was absolutely vilified. I think so many people were just really not happy that I went public. When I wrote the novel, I was a little bit critical of Oxford as an institution, and that really didn’t do me any favors. No, I did not get many admirers. [laughs] It wasn’t my greatest career move. However, I wanted to flush her out, and I wanted her to stop. I was absolutely determined that something positive would come out of this horrible — because it is distressing. I know I make light of it, but it is really, really horrible. It was so nasty and vicious and cruel. Then you just think, “Who is it?” Then you start thinking, “Is it my friend, or is it so and so?” You do become quite paranoid. I really feel sorry for famous people because I’m like, they must get this all the time, and then who do you trust? It’s hard enough in an Oxford college to trust anybody because they’re all such backstabbers. I was like, “Oh, my God, what if it’s somebody who sees me every day? ” You do become a little bit paranoid. But I think writing the novel was cathartic, and it did enable me to step back from it and say, “Come on, this is actually quite funny. ” I didn’t get any people saying good — just a couple of people went, “Good on you. Good on you for doing that,” but not many. Do you think there’s some element of jealousy? That you are Lady Bate, and that in some sense someone feels that’s not deserved, and it’s a sort of protest.…

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