Speaking with a mix of precision and vulnerability, Tempest describes the novel as a uniquely demanding form—one that requires total immersion in the inner lives of imagined people.

Throughout the interview, Tempest emphasizes the exhaustive attention required to make a fictional world feel lived-in. “You have to know everything about everybody. You have to know every single day of their lives,” he says, explaining how unseen drafts and discarded characters still shape the emotional logic of the final narrative. Writing a novel, he notes, is not a liberating escape but “fucking intense,” a process of returning to difficult memories and transforming him into something new.

Tempest describes fiction as a technology of connection: “These novels, these are empathy machines. This is a very advanced technology, the story.” For him, the power of narrative lies in its ability to shift perspective, reminding readers that “you just don’t know what’s happening for a person” and encouraging a momentary suspension of judgment.

Discussing his novel Having Spent Life Seeking (2026) and it’s protagonist Rothko—an ex-convict whose life is shaped by addiction, institutionalization, and the failures of family systems—Tempest insists on resisting moral simplification. “Nobody should be condemned,” he says, recalling one of the guiding principles taped to his studio wall during the writing process. The novel’s structure, he explained, mirrors the complexity of lived experience: beauty intertwined with violence, forgiveness with grief, and community with isolation.

Tempest also reflects on the landscapes that inform his work, particularly the British coastline. “I love what happens at the edge of the land… it gives me this perspective that I need in order to feel like I can face anything,” he says, describing the horizon as both liberating and claustrophobic—a duality that shapes the fictional city of Edgecliff.

The conversation reveals a writer deeply committed to the emotional truth of his characters, willing to cut entire storylines to avoid “unintentional repetition,” and attentive to the mysterious moment when a character begins to “speak and you just eavesdrop and you just listen. It’s an encounter.”

Kae Tempest (born 1985 in London) is a writer, poet, playwright, and recording artist known for his genre-crossing body of work. His achievements include the bestselling poetry collections Hold Your Own (2014) and Let Them Eat Chaos (2016), the Mercury Prize–nominated albums Everybody Down and Let Them Eat Chaos, and the acclaimed novels The Bricks That Built the Houses and Divisible by Itself and One. Tempest has received the Ted Hughes Award for Brand New Ancients (2013), and is widely recognized for his innovative fusion of spoken word, music, and narrative craft.

Kae Tempest was interviewed by poet Caspar Eric at the Louisiana Literature festival, in August 2026, at the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Denmark

Cameras: Rasmus Quistgaard

Edit: Signe Boe Pedersen

Produced by Christian Lund

Copyright: Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2026

Louisiana Channel is supported by Den A.P. Møllerske Støttefond.