Very Blue Peter!
Ex-presenter Janet Ellis on award shortlist for worst sex scene in fiction
SHE cut her creative teeth in children’s TV, delighting young viewers with her wholesome smile and innocent antics. Given that background, former Blue Peter presenter Janet Ellis was always going to find it tough in the more adult world of literature. And so it has proved.
For Miss Ellis has found herself shortlisted for a prize that few writers want – the Bad Sex in Fiction Award. The nomination comes from the actress’s attempt to describe a raunchy scene in her debut novel, The Butcher’s Hook.
Given by the Literary Review, the award aims to draw attention to ‘poorly written, perfunctory or redundant passages of sexual description in modern fiction’.
Miss Ellis, 61, who presented the children’s show from 1983 to 1987, put a brave face on her nomination yesterday, saying that she considered it ‘something of a compliment’ to join the prestigious list of nominees. The Butcher’s Hook is one of six so far shortlisted for the award, won last year by the singer Morrissey and his passage describing a ‘bulbous salutation’.
The other five are US authors Ethan Canin and Gayle Forman, Austrian Robert Seethaler, Italian Erri de Luca and filmmaker and writer Tom Connolly.
Taking about her nomination, Miss Ellis, whose daughter is pop singer Sophie Ellis-Bextor, 37, said: ‘When I looked at the other authors I thought, “Yeah, they are role models”. I haven’t slept with any of them but I’m perfectly happy to be in on the side.
‘Only last week I was at Buckingham Palace picking up my MBE so I’m hoping for something equally lovely to put on the mantelpiece.’
She was given her honour for services to charities and theatre by the Duke of Cambridge.
Miss Ellis said had re-read her sex scene and ‘would stand by it’, adding: ‘I think sex is notoriously difficult to write about because most people who are reading the book will have some experience of it. Obviously you’re trying to find a very new way to describe some- thing old but I actually think I’ve achieved it. If somebody has actually bothered to read through all those sex scenes and mine is one of the ones that has, ahem, stood out, I’m fine with that.
‘It was my first novel and first time writing about sex. It all sounds like a Carry On film now but I did think long and hard.’
Asked for the inspiration behind her scene, she added: ‘Obviously as a Blue Peter presenter I don’t really know about sex so I had to rely on my imagination!’
Set in London in the 18th century, Miss Ellis’s dark thriller tells the story of Anne Jaccob, the eldest daughter of comfortably-off parents. The panel of five judges at the Literary Review singled out a passage in which Anne consummates her relationship with butcher’s apprentice Fub.
Mrs Ellis, who presented the BBC children’s programme Jigsaw from 1979 before joining Blue Peter, also writes an advice column for the Daily Mail.
She left Blue Peter in 1987 amid rumours she was sacked for being unmarried and pregnant with Jackson Ellis-Leach, her first son with John Leach, her second husband. However, she has insisted she left by mutual consent.
She returned to TV as an actress from 2000, appearing on shows including the crime drama Waking the Dead and Hotel Babylon. She has also been a panellist and had stints on daytime programmes.
‘I had to rely on my imagination’