Colin MacInnes - Absolute Beginners (1959)

Absolute Beginners is, unfortunately, now best remembered for a lacklustre 1980s film version (except among neo-mods, where it remains a well-kept secret, depicting as it does the formative days of coffee bars, scooters and jazz as subcultural pursuits). The work is divided into four months; while there is no strong central narrative arc, the early part concerns the unnamed narrator’s life as an amateur photographer (and pornographer) and his amorous pursuit of his ex-girlfriend, Crepe Suzette, while the later – well, we’ll come to that. This is the second book in MacInnes’ London Trilogy, and, like the first (the impressive City of Spades), it is set on the fringes of London’s seamier cultural systems, and written in a colloquial-poetic register which is sometimes reminiscent of a more cheerful Hubert Selby Jr.

While CoS dealt as its central subject with relationships between black and white Londoners and African migrants, AB focuses on the teenager and ‘the birth of cool’ – and, published in 1959, we are in the early years of existence of that particular demographic – as the eighteen-year-old narrator points out, his is the first generation in which ‘yoof’ (as they’re now known) had the spare cash for independence, and the leisure of not yet being completely incorporated into the systems of adulthood (as well as chrysalidic mods, teddy boys are a central subcultural focus, in a not-so-sympathetic depiction). So while in today’s light there sometimes seems to be a naivete about the Caulfield-esque narrator – a narratorially-approved lack of acknowledgment of the way in which the image conscious and apolitical teenager does not, in fact, stand outside the system – this can perhaps be attributed to the originality of the concerns he describes in era in question, combined with the well-rehearsed figure of today’s teen, more even than at that period completely subsumed as a figure of capital and consumption. Furthermore, the question of involvement and apathy is raised in the book’s concluding episode, dealing with the narrator’s response to race riots. On this note, in some ways the work can also be seen as a bildungsroman, as the narrator, on the cusp of adulthood, transcends an individualistic and amoral focus on the survival of the self as project, and then on the pursuit of cash, to become a figure sobered by the death of his father and a central mover in fashioning a community response to the appalling prejudice and brutality of emerging white-on-black prejudice and violence (such as that which occurred in 1958) – leading to a final decision to leave behind the city, unrealizable and perhaps utopian romantic hopes, and the familiar which has now been outgrown.

As in City of Spades, race is a central concern, and MacInnes is perhaps the central figure for the exploration of this trope, the anxieties (and cultural enrichment) caused by the reversing of the direction of Empire as it crumbled. As in CoS, not only racial outsiders but others, such as queers (MacInnes himself was openly bisexual) and pimps, are sympathetically depicted, if, again as in that novel, with occasional tonalities and implications which may strike a slightly off note for the contemporary reader – and female characters are not his strong point, though some, such as lesbian pimp Big Jill, shine here. Ultimately, this is not as strong a work as CoS, and it has the same tendency to mild didacticism. However, it is nonetheless a deeply original novel which, if it depicts a particular and formative moment in the balance between various identity relationships, still resonates in the present day (particularly with the recent resurgence of the BNP). AB is ultimately (and in this way it seems like a forerunner of the sublime-grotesque kitchen-sink urban imagery we find in the lyrics of bands like Pulp) a conflicted paean to a gorgeously-depicted city, at a tense moment of cultural crux and flux.

Colin MacInnes – City of Spades (1957)

My interest in City of Spades was initially inspired by a growing fascination with mod subculture. MacInnes’ Absolute Beginners is considered to be a classic evocation of the mod era, but CoS was the work that I managed to pick up secondhand, and also the first in the London Trilogy, of which AB is the second. And it was certainly absolutely worthwhile, particularly but not only if one has an interest in the Caribbean and African diasporas in London (for me, initially a function of a serious obsession with reggae, again tying us back to the ‘60s and the overlap between skinhead and mod culture – both characterised by a fascination with black music, in particular early ska, reggae & northern soul).

The text is experimental around the edges, using contemporary argot and some startling and original descriptive and metaphorical language, but the narrative is essentially straightforward – the misadventures of Johnny Fortune, a charismatic Nigerian in 1950s London. The first-person voice alternates between that of Fortune himself (an interesting technique which today might be more controversial, the emulation of a black voice by a white writer) and that of his increasingly exasperated friend Montgomery Pew, a white man caught between the slatternly iniquities of English racism, bureaucracy and the colonial mindset (some refrains of which, unfortunately, remains all too familiar), and the black world, in relation to which he feels desire, ambiguity and exclusion. The subjects with which the novel deals are deeply controversial (and must have been even more so at the time), including drug taking, prostitution, abortion, homosexuality (perhaps the ‘otherness’ least sympathetically dealt with, though nonetheless not completely viewed through the eyes of prejudice), and inter-racial sexual relationships.

In today’s milieu, some of the views expressed (though certainly appropriate to the characters) which seem to hold a certain amount of authorial sympathy would be considered problematic, but for the period this is an astonishingly nuanced representation of race and race relations, and, although I would be the last to decry political correctness in the way which is such a fashionable catch-all condemnation, there is a freshness to this writing which reflects an era in which these questions of representation were still in the embryonic phases of being picked over and examined. On the note of race and literature, Caryl Phillips has written an excellent and considered reflection on the absence of black characters in canonical 1950s London novels (a period when that society was changing deeply and indelibly as a result of black immigration), which deals in depth with CoS as an exception (which, incidentally, also mentions Shelagh Delaney’s A Taste of Honey, a play I first came across as a foundational work for Morrissey). One aspect of the intercultural situation well-captured by the novel is the deep desire felt by the white characters for the black Other (particularly in relation to sexuality and authenticity), a desire which may form the only real basis of agency graspable by the black subject in order to speak back to the centre. This desire in itself may be an issue for the modern reader– an aspect explored by Phillips – one made particularly manifest, for this reader, in a growing frustration with the seeming inexhaustibility of Johnny’s allure, sexual and otherwise, in the face of his increasingly cruel and manipulative behaviour (though perhaps there is a touch of realism in this connection). However, apart from anything else, the underculture in which the novel immerses the reader, along with the beguiling kitchen-sink quality of the drama and the purposefully unresolved notes of intertwined hopelessness and hope which the novel sounds make not only for an immersive socio-historical document, but also a deeply vital and arresting read.

Shirley Jackson - Life Among The Savages (1952)

Although I tend to think her best known story, The Lottery, is over-rated in comparison to the rest of her work, Shirley Jackson is, in my opinion, one of the finest practitioners of the art of the short story. That her work tends to the darkly-inflected makes it even more of a treat. I also can't praise the novels of hers I've read, The Haunting of Hill House and the neglected We Have Always Lived In The Castle too highly.

So I tracked down her book Life Among The Savages, a lightly-fictionalised, humorous book-length memoir of family life. The pieces were first published individually in women's magazines (Jackson was determined to live by her writing) - in tone, the work compares to some of the 'light' stories which have been published in Just An Ordinary Day. To be honest, though, LATS hasn't really stood the test of time. Jackson's spare, understated prose style is very much in evidence, and it works well in a comic setting, but the material is very light and sometimes repetitious (befitting its provenance). In particular, what seemed an amusing, self-deprecating story in the 1950s looks like a tale of the acceptance of misogynistic conditions and family structures in the present day; and that acceptance makes the reader (or at least this reader) consistently frustrated - especially considering Jackson's gifts in comparison with her husband, who comes across more as selfish than endearing, as well as the fact that Jackson also worked to earn a wage through her writing, therefore stepping outside any view which might see equity in the choice for one partner to be a breadwinner while leaving domestic and childrearing duties to the other.

One point of interest is the inclusion of material that can also be found elsewhere, and the way its tone is shaped by the context - here we find a section which is included, as a short story, in The Lottery and Other Stories under the title Charles (the small print tells us that it's included at the request of her son Lawrence, who is the main character); but while in the context of The Lottery it has a sinister, 'bad seed' air, here it takes on a 'kids say the darndest things' air - an interesting comment on the ways in which the reader is subtly guided by factors outside the work itself; and of course, Jackson's work is premised on the unspoken, on meaning constructed through context.

Overall, however, even as a huge Jackson fan, I found LATS more of a curiosity - and an evocation of a particular historical era and its attitudes - than a rewarding read as such.

Patricia Wentworth - The Gazebo (1958)

I had this novel sitting on my shelf for quite a while, having not read any Wentworth and being unsure that the writing would be up to scratch - but once I opened it up, I enjoyed it a lot as a straightforward little whodunnit of the English old school. Wentworth's 'detective' is Miss Maud Silver, who bears a more than passing resemblance to Miss Marple (Marple's first appearance was in 1927 and Silver's in 1928; so I won't draw any conclusions about the coincidence or otherwise of this resemblance).

The story has all the ingredients of which I'm very fond in crime: an English village setting, a strong period atmosphere (contemporary, of course, at the time of writing), a heavy lashing of understated but cutting manners and cultural elitism, and a little old lady who's a lot sharper than she seems. The story begins with the unexpected return of Nicholas Carey, Althea's old beau; Althea's controlling, hypochondriac mother prevented their marriage five years previously, and Nicholas is determined not to let it happen again. At the same time, there are two mysteriously high offers on the house Althea's father left to her, where she lives with her mother... The murder itself doesn't occur until about a third of the way into the book, and I also appreciated the establishment of setting and character in the intervening period.

The writing itself is by no means outstanding, but Wentworth's modest style sits nicely with her modest ambitions and carries us along into her lace-curtain-concealed intrigues. The gender and class politics are, as they tend to be in this type of work, problematic, but certainly not to an extent which caused me personally any irritation or difficulty with the work overall. Characterisation, again, tended to the shallow at times, particularly in regard to the characters' emotional responses to the events of the story, but no-one expects deep psychological characterisation to be a strength of this type of work.

To a certain extent, I'd see this as a sub-Marple work, but nonetheless as a piece of classic English crime escapism I very much enjoyed it, and I'll definitely be reading more of Wentworth's Miss Silver stories.

John Kennedy Toole - The Neon Bible (wr. 1953; pub. 1989)

Before being given this book, I hadn't realised that John Kennedy Toole, who killed himself at the age of thirty-two, had produced anything other than the wonderful, rollicking black satire A Confederacy of Dunces; and the story behind the publication of that work (due entirely to the persistent efforts of Toole's mother, Thelma, after his death) seemed astonishing enough. In some ways, the publication of The Neon Bible was even more unlikely. Written when the author was only sixteen and located after the wildly succesful publication of Confederacy, due to a complicated but somehow appropriate set of legal circumstances stemming from the oddities of Lousianan inheritance law, Thelma Toole attempted, succesfully during her lifetime, to stop the publication of the work. We have reason, however, to be grateful that she was ultimately unsuccesful.

This is an entirely different work to Confederacy, and one which will not appeal to everyone who enjoyed that novel. It is in a certain sense a classic example of the American outsider bildungsroman, following the development of its protagonist, David, in a small Louisiana town in the period preceding, during and after the Second World War.

In the first place, it's astonishing to consider that this is the work of a sixteen year old. While at times this is clearer than others (for example, in the hasty, out-of-character, and temporally overconvenient events leading to the end of the book and David's departure from the town), overall it displays an emotional maturity and a use of language which bely the author's youth. To me, the work didn't have the narrative pull of Confederacy; but it's more of an exploration than a story, a work in which the town itself is a character in the same way that New Orleans is in Confederacy, and in the classic American tradition of the centrality of geographical location in fiction. This may also be understood as one reason for the novel's sombre tone; as in Confederacy, we are concerned with outsiders, the way in which they deal with their status as such through complex and shifting alliances and acts of acceptance and rebellion - and to be an outsider in a small town is a very different question from being an outsider in a big city. The depiction of the torments and vicissitudes of this life are moving without becoming a litany of cruelties in the manner of more recent 'loser literature'.

In its exploration of small town hypocrisy and the stifling of the individual and the outsider, particularly as regards Christianity, and in its quasi-gothic sense of place and spare, stilted, yet still eloquent language, TNB reminded me of works from Flannery O'Connor's Wise Blood to Nick Cave's And the Ass Saw The Angel. The other great strength of the work, to my mind, is the character of Aunt Mae who, like the central characters in Confederacy, is a creation who lives and breathes in the imagination of the reader beyond the confines of the novel itself.

Overall, while it is evident that this is the work of a writer in the process of formation, it is a better book than many written by succesful adult authors; and one which can be given interesting multiple readings, both in light of Toole's life and Confederacy, and in the tradition of the obsessions of the American novel.