{"id":382636,"date":"2026-04-05T04:10:30","date_gmt":"2026-04-05T04:10:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/382636\/"},"modified":"2026-04-05T04:10:30","modified_gmt":"2026-04-05T04:10:30","slug":"john-banville-im-counting-on-an-aneurysm-i-dont-want-to-be-in-the-old-folks-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/382636\/","title":{"rendered":"John Banville: \u2018I\u2019m counting on an aneurysm. I don\u2019t want to be in the old folks\u2019 home\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-91174671_secondary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom4 indo-1d70522a_marginleft0 indo-1d70522a_marginright0 indo-1d70522a_margintop4\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\" data-testid=\"title-summary\">\nThe reflective author discusses agreeing to things because he thought he\u2019d be dead by now, former wild parties at his Howth home, his no-wine policy when he\u2019s writing, and why he won\u2019t try marijuana again\n<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Author John Banville at home in Howth, Co Dublin. Photo: Steve Humphreys\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/JOHN BANVILLE 12SH.jpg\" loading=\"eager\" width=\"100%\" data-testid=\"article-image\"  \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_caption1 indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_secondary indo-66f0fec7_regular indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_marginleft0 indo-1d70522a_marginright0 indo-1d70522a_margintop3 indo-b48c4984_left\" style=\"color:var(--color-grey-60)\">Author John Banville at home in Howth, Co Dublin. Photo: Steve Humphreys<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">John Banville lives in a spacious, terraced house on a steep street in Howth village. There is art on the walls; several pieces by Irish artist Stephen Lawlor, gallery photography, and photos of a more personal nature taken by Madeline McGahern, wife of the late John McGahern.<\/p>\n<p class=\"indo-ebe0ecc6_root indo-ebe0ecc6_paragraph indo-300db776_none indo-91174671_primary indo-1d70522a_marginbottom0 indo-1d70522a_margintop0 indo-b48c4984_inherit\" style=\"color:var(--color-primary-80)\">One snap features Banville\u2019s own late, and somewhat estranged, spouse Janet Dunham. The couples had been friends.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The reflective author discusses agreeing to things because he thought he\u2019d be dead by now, former wild parties&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":382637,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[93,61,60,279],"class_list":{"0":"post-382636","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-review-magazine"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=382636"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/382636\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/382637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=382636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=382636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=382636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}