Moments of searing honesty, like those from Robbie Williams, Lesley Manville and Nick Cave, are precious

Robbie Williams recently spoke his explosive truth when talking about sex in his marriage. Picture: Getty Images

Honesty is a bridge. It extends a hand. It is vulnerability yet also strength. It can break deadlocks. Soften, repair. It is the raw underbelly of who we are – and if we reveal our truth, bravely, we often realise we’re not so different from others after all.

Franz Kafka wrote of the intriguing power in truth-telling: “Don’t bend; don’t water it down; don’t try to make it logical; don’t edit your own soul according to the fashion.”

And so to Robbie Williams, who recently did not bend his soul to fashion. The rock god spoke his explosive truth when talking about sex in his marriage. He was utterly honest from a male perspective, and it felt precious and rare.

“Everyone knows there is no sex after marriage,” he told a newspaper.

“That’s just the way it is.” Man speaks truth. Man does not blame woman. Man owns up, and it was incredibly powerful.

The father of four is happily married to the beautiful Ayda and he said of his previous sex life: “I miss that. That was a fun period. Sometimes now, though, Ayda will turn to me on the sofa and say, ‘We should do sex’, and I’m sitting there eating a tangerine and just sort of shrug.”

Robbie Williams, pictured in 1996, says his past world was full of insecurity. Picture: Getty Images

“Nothing in this world is harder than speaking the truth,” Dostoevsky wrote. Williams set off a little depth-charge of truth that reverberated across the planet. How jaded, insecure, straight-jacketed that rock star image of multiple wives and girlfriends decades younger suddenly appeared. That past world was insecurity. Neurosis. Instability. Yet Williams seems grounded, content, mature.

“Honesty is the first chapter of the book wisdom,” Thomas Jefferson said and it so often comes with age, as we move beyond our carefully curated selves; the lie we present to the world. As Robbie explained of that younger self: “I hated myself and thought I couldn’t sing and looked like s..t. If anyone thought I was wandering round with an inflated sense of self-importance it was actually the opposite.”

Lesley Manville. Picture: Getty Images

Another recent beacon of honesty is the actress Lesley Manville. She lives happily alone, and is asked about this insistently. Why? What is so monstrous, so threatening about a woman living man-free by choice?

“If I don’t have somebody at home, I don’t have to consider them,” the twice divorced mother and grandmother explained. “While warmth and all that is wonderful for some people, I just think, ‘Well, phew. Thank goodness.’ Because I’ve got so much else to do… I like the uncluttered nature of my life.”

She added: “Most men my age want somebody doing things for them. In that respect, I’m not their girl… The cocktail of the man I need is so difficult… it’s harder as you get older. Most men my age are with someone. They tend not to be good on their own. They’re needy.” Manville is speaking her risky truth and it feels courageous and connecting.

Another beacon of grace, when it comes to honesty, is Nick Cave. He’s reached a point in life where his heart is wide open and he doesn’t care what others think, particularly in terms of audacious spirituality. As he ages he’s become a risk-taker in terms of honesty, and blazes with strength and integrity because of it.

Nick Cave. Picture: Getty Images

“It’s discouraging to think how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit,” Noël Coward wrote. We’ll often shy away from uncomfortable truths – deny, hide, fudge – rather than face them square on. But we’re entering an era of social honesty and it feels like an antidote to the fakers. It’s deeply, intensely human. Connecting. Clean. Rare.

As the poet Czeslaw Milosz wrote, “In a room where / people unanimously maintain / a conspiracy of silence, / one word of truth / sounds like a pistol shot.” Thank you Robbie, Lesley and Nick. Thank you to anyone who has the courage to be honest, vulnerably.