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Post by Lord Emsworth on Jan 21, 2020 8:28:43 GMT
I'm currently halfway through.... A Kind of Loving by Stan Barstow...and so far it's really great. I've also got the film adaptation to watch once I've finished the book which I last viewed a good few decades ago Exciting times I think you'll agree The blurb... A Kind of Loving is the first of a trilogy, published over the course of sixteen years, that followed hero Vic Brown through marriage, divorce and a move from the mining town of Cressley to London. The other two parts are The Watchers On The Shore and The Right True End. Here's the synopsis.... All about love, lust, and loneliness, the book introduces Vic Brown, a young working-class Yorkshireman. Vic is attracted to the beautiful but demanding Ingrid, and as their relationship grows and changes, he comes to terms the hard way with adult life and what it really means to love. The influence of Barstow's novel has been lasting the literary label "lad-lit" was first applied to this book, and over the years it has been adapted for radio, television, and the big screen.Originally published in 1960, this popular novel about frustrated youth laid the groundwork for contemporary writers such as Tony Parsons and Nick Hornby.   |
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Jan 23, 2020 15:25:12 GMT
Finished.
Here's for a few thoughts....
I've read many of the kitchen sink/angry young man novels of the late 1950s and early 1960s (by the likes of Alan Sillitoe, John Braine, David Storey and Keith Waterhouse) and what differentiates A Kind of Loving (1960) is the personality of central character Vic Brown.
A Kind of Loving is a clear eyed, unsentimental and realistic portrait of an intelligent young man who gets trapped in a loveless marriage having got Ingrid, his girlfriend, pregnant. Stan Barstow's genius here is to keep Vic a sympathetic character despite some cynical decisions and bad behaviour.
Unlike Joe Lampton in Room at the Top, Vic is relatively content with his life and prospects and, like his recently married sister, aspires to fall in love and enjoy a happy marriage. Despite a powerful physical attraction to Ingrid he knows he doesn't love her but feels compelled to get married once she falls pregnant.
Although the heart of the novel is an exploration of Vic's confusion and anguish at being trapped in the expectations of respectable working class families at the moment society was starting to change, it is also powerful and effective in its depiction of life in a small Yorkshire town in 1960. It's all so intensely evoked: the pubs, the work places, family life, smoking, cinemas, cafes, dancehalls etc.
This unpatronising portrayal of working class life in northern England in 1960 remains a vivid and powerful read.
5/5
A Kind of Loving was the first of a trilogy, published over the course of sixteen years, that followed hero Vic Brown through marriage, divorce and a move from the mining town of Cressley to London. The other two parts are The Watchers On The Shore and The Right True End.
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Feb 20, 2020 12:13:25 GMT
I've just finished The Watchers On The Shore (1966) - the second book in the Vic Brown trilogy I loved Stan Barstow's unpatronising portrayal of working class life in northern England in 1960 which, 60 years on, remains a vivid and powerful read. I rated it five stars. Needless to say, when I discovered that Stan Barstow had written two more follow ups, to create a Vic Brown trilogy, I was straight onto eBay and buying copies of these two out of print books. The story picks three or four years after A Kind of Loving and takes place during the end of 1962 and the start of 1963. A Kind of Loving ends with a determination on Vic's part to make his marriage work however this mood of positivity has ebbed away by the start of The Watchers On The Shore. Before long Vic has moved to Essex to team up with his old friend Conroy who offers him a job as a draughtman back in engineering in the fictional town of Longford in Essex. Ingrid stays put, partly to nurse her sick and widowed mother, and partly to allow Vic to scope out the area. The Watchers On The Shore is a somewhat downbeat and pessimistic book from the off. Unlike A Kind of Loving it lacks a sense of place. I had a vivid impression of Cressley, Vic’s home town in Yorkshire, in the first book. This is completely lacking for Longford. Vic's sense of entitlement also increases dramatically in The Watchers On The Shore, he is far less likeable and seems unable to empathise with anyone else. Ingrid is only glimpsed occasionally in this book and the new characters are somewhat undeveloped by comparison. Overall The Watchers On The Shore lacks much of what makes A Kind of Loving so masterly. That said, I was engrossed throughout and look forward to the third and final part of the trilogy - The Right True End (1976). 4/5  |
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Post by Deleted on Jun 15, 2020 20:09:34 GMT
The film is on Talking Pictures TV tonight. Been at least 20 years since I've seen it.
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Jun 16, 2020 6:03:53 GMT
I watched it recently. Really stands up. I've now also finished the third book in the trilogy - the whole thing is well worth a read
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Post by Deleted on Jun 16, 2020 8:40:27 GMT
I'm going to watch it today. Do you remember the dreadful TV version of it on ITV back in the 80's?
Recently watched 'A Taste of Honey' too. Groundbreaking for its time👍
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Jun 16, 2020 13:08:17 GMT
I've got that TV version on DVD to watch soon
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Post by Deleted on Jun 16, 2020 17:33:09 GMT
I didn't like it. Possibly because it was in colour but not exclusively.
Those old films just capture that twilight of moving on from Post WW2 England into the modern world we grew up in.
The portrayals are probably quite unique to the period( late 50's/early 60's).
I mean can you imagine any of them being remade today?
Jesus Wept!
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Jun 16, 2020 17:35:07 GMT
Did you see that recent(ish) remake of Brighton Rock?
Perfectly fine but not a patch on the Boulting Brothers classic with Richard Attenborough as Pinkie
I watched it thinking what's the point?
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Post by Deleted on Jun 16, 2020 18:13:08 GMT
I always would give them a go but it would never be same.
The last time I saw Brighton Rock was at least 35 years ago!
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Post by Lord Emsworth on Jun 16, 2020 18:39:09 GMT
Still a brilliant film
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Post by Deleted on Jun 17, 2020 16:50:09 GMT
I watched the film this Afternoon. Rather sad wasn't it?
From that initial spark of attraction and the coy courtship to becoming 'responsible'adults and having to deal with expectations.
Such is the naivety of youth.
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