What makes coren so cross

But then things really start to go awry for the journalist whose incandescent email to Times subs was an internet sensation. Fortunately however, this dire situation does appear to have improved at the time of writing — in spite of a threat not to do the Steve Wright show on Radio 2, he has reported that the Amazon problem" is "sorted" and that his publishers have sent him a "Happy pubication day" card and "a nice bottle of louis roederer so I sort of forgive them".

Might be worth tuning in from 2pm , then. Giles Coren brings publisher to book. Giles Coren: 'Why are all publishers so fucking shit? And breathe. As anger management techniques go, it's elementary stuff, but it usually does the trick. I want to tell Giles Coren, the notoriously splenetic restaurant critic and columnist for The Times, about it, because even though he has just written a book called Anger Management for Beginners, he is pacing like a chained zoo bear when we meet.

He has just come from a viewing of the new Sex and the City film which, given the reviews, has perhaps not improved his mood. But he has to pack, and read, and think, and now The IoS is here to see him. It seems vaguely appropriate that Coren should be spitting teeth for an interview to promote a book about anger.

It strikes me this is an elaborate publicity stunt. But no. This interview was due to last half an hour but in the spirit of compromise I say let's do 10 minutes. In the end it lasts less than a minute before Coren stands up and calls it off.

A few fucks later, coupled with a hasty apology, and I'm standing in the street, Dictaphone whirring. Perhaps it was my first question that did it: "Are you a naturally angry man? He never did answer, but later he calls to apologise. Of course I would rather be talking to you than spending four hours of a sunny afternoon watching Sex and the City and reading a Tony Parsons novel. In fact, I got off lightly; Coren has been in therapy for years to deal with his anger, and in the past there would have been a lot more shouting.

I have used the word 'gaily' as a gentle nudge. And "looking for a nosh" has a secondary meaning of looking for a blowjob. Not specifically gay, for this is soho, and there are plenty of girls there who take money for noshing boys. I only wrote that sodding paragraph to make that joke. And you've fucking stripped it out like a pissed Irish plasterer restoring a renaissance fresco and thinking jesus looks shit with a bear so plastering over it.

You might as well have removed the whole paragraph. I mean, fucking christ, don't you read the copy? Dumbest, deafest, shittest of all, you have removed the unstressed 'a' so that the stress that should have fallen on "nosh" is lost, and my piece ends on an unstressed syllable. When you're winding up a piece of prose, metre is crucial.

Can't you hear? Can't you hear that it is wrong? It's not fucking rocket science. It's fucking pre-GCSE scansion. I have written restaurant reviews for The Times and i have never ended on an unstressed syllable. I am sorry if this looks petty last time i mailed a Times sub about the change of a single word i got in all sorts of trouble but i care deeply about my work and i hate to have it fucked up by shit subbing.

I have been away, you've been subbing joe and hugo and maybe they just file and fuck off and think "hey ho, it's tomorrow's fish and chips" - well, not me. I woke up at three in the morning on sunday and fucking lay there, furious, for two hours. It strips me of all confidence in writing for the magazine.