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Bradley Trevor Greive
This issue, rather than just reviewing books, we decided to speak to the man and the dreamer behind the works. Tina Shaw met with Bradley Trevor Greive and gained a little insight into the incredibly inspirational author behind The Blue Day Book.
SPB: Where did you first get the idea for The Blue Day Book?
BTG: It was the eighth or ninth book [that he had written] over seven or eight years, but it was my first book published. Here I was, an aspiring author who just couldn’t seem to break through. It was getting so demoralising and all I had to show for it was a telephone book full of rejection letters. I was single, feeling pretty lousy and living in a rat infested studio (and writing some appalling poetry).
One thing that you can do as a creative person is use your experiences and put it into your work. The Blue Day book was born from that. When I wrote, “the world turns grey and I grow tired”, I started thinking about what the world would be like if it did go grey and then I started thinking about how animals (dogs) see the world in grey all the time and I started to laugh. It just went from there.
SPB: What was your day job before The 'Day’ Book Empire took off?
BTG: I was a soldier actually. It was a sobering experience but a wonderful one and through it I learnt a lot about myself and other people. It gave me a great deal in terms of self awareness and awareness of others. I think it gave me an advantage as an artist, as I have personally experienced real hardship. I did go to the Cambodian war in 1989 and I now take myself much less seriously (but my work very seriously).
All of my other books have now gone ahead and been published. If you believe that you have a book in you, you just have to persevere, as you probably do. You have to believe in yourself and create something beautiful.
I’m a busy, creative person and the bottom line is, that that’s all that I do, but goddamn it gets done – we don’t like missing deadlines. Must be the soldier in me.
SPB: Who are your audience, i.e. who do you write for?
BTG: The statistics tell us that most books are purchased by women from about 25 – late 40’s. But I write for an audience of one, I write the books I want to read.
SPB: I have just finished reading the Blue Day Book for kids and loved it. Why, when you have no children of your own, did you decide to put this one together?
BTG: One of the great things about the success we’ve enjoyed, is that we don’t have to do anything we don’t want to - so the stuff that I do, I want to do beautifully. Opportunities come up and when this one presented itself to me and was such a great opportunity to spread out a little bit, I went for it. This particular book was very special, because I really enjoyed writing it.
When you are small, Christmas trees are a hundred feet tall and stubbing your toe is like losing a leg. If anybody needs a lesson in perspective it’s children. I do want to have children someday; it’s something that I really look forward to. In many ways I am the little boy who has never grown up. I am this 6 foot three monster and I am delighted at the prospect of wrestling and playing with my kids.
SPB: Way back when, when you first put the Blue Day Book together, did you have this vision of all of the products and other books that you would ultimately create, or is this a huge surprise to you? I mean you have built an empire around feeling good.
BTG: You make it sound like this huge polished thing and the reality is, that I am a guy sitting in his chair looking at a blank piece of paper and thinking 'hey this might work'. I don’t think in a clinical strategic way, I just enjoy the momentum that creativity presents and that’s all I try to do to fulfil my obligation to the people who get behind me. I am responsible for every product and I sign off on everything. I am very grateful to the people who support me, but ultimately it is my name that is on everything.
SPB: What kind of a difference do you hope that the Blue Day Book series will make?
BTG: They make a difference to me when I write them and I hope that they give people the opportunity to look at life a little differently. They don’t pretend to change the world, I just hope that people appreciate my humour and truly feel happy when reading the books.
One last message from Mr Greive…
“Get out there and live your life. You’ve got to live an interesting life if you want to create interesting work. Talent is like a muscle. It’s a use it or lose it situation. The more you use it the more you will realise if you have a gift or not.”
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