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Absolute Beginners (London Trilogy), by Colin MacInnes
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‘I swore by Elvis and all the saints that this last teenage year of mine was going to be a real rave. Yes, man, come whatever, this last year of the teenage dream I was out for kicks and fantasy’
London, 1958. A new phenomenon is causing a stir: the teenager.
In the smoky jazz clubs of Soho and the coffee bars of Notting Hill the young and the restless - the absolute beginners - are revolutionising youth culture and forging a new carefree lifestyle of sex, drugs and rock‘n’roll. Moving in the midst of this world of mods and rockers, Teddy gangs and trads., and snapping every scene with his trusty Rolleiflex, is MacInnes’ young photographer, whose unique wit and honest views remain the definitive account of London life in the 1950s and what it means to be a teenager.
In this twentieth century cult classic, MacInnes captures the spirit of a generation and creates the style bible for anyone interested in Mod culture, and the changing face of London in the era of the first race riots and the lead up to the swinging Sixties...
- Sales Rank: #171783 in eBooks
- Published on: 2011-10-06
- Released on: 2011-10-06
- Format: Kindle eBook
Review
The writing is breathtaking. Every word carefully selected to draw you further and further in. Occasionally it becomes reminiscent of A Clockwork Orange with the teenagers having their own language and their own world, only half understood by the adults they hold in so much contempt... Buy this book. And then buy a copy for all your friends as well. (The Bookbag)
About the Author
COLIN MACINNES (1914-76), son of novelist Angela Thirkell, cousin of Stanley Baldwin and Rudyard Kipling, grandson of Burne-Jones, was brought up in Australia but lived most of his life in London about which he wrote with a warts-and-all relish that earned him a reputation as the literary Hogarth of his day. Bisexual, outsider, champion of youth, ‘pale-pink’ friend of Black Londoners and chronicler of English life, MacInnes described himself as ‘a very nosy person’ who ‘found adultery in Hampstead indescribably dull’ and was much more at home in the coffee bars and jazz clubs of Soho and Notting Hill. A talented off-beat journalist and social observer, he is best known for his three London novels, City of Spades, Absolute Beginners and Mr Love and Justice. MacInnes died of cancer in 1976.
Most helpful customer reviews
17 of 17 people found the following review helpful.
Colin MacInnes-- Absolute Beginners
By shawn@net-connect.net
A must have for anyone interested in youth culture, swinging london of the 1950s and 60s, and the Mod scene... Something of a youth exploitation or confessional novel, but nonetheless an excellent picture of the generation born in post-world war II England, the first (and possibly one of the last) to be better off than their parents, the children of Britain's baby boom, obsessed with Italian fashion and American Jazz and all night clubs and coffee houses-- this is a portrait of one such youth and his life... It's the best piece of this type to come out of this period and seen by many as MacInnes' best work. Of further note by MacInnes are the other "London novels", Mr. Love and Justice and City of Spades. What a shame it is that no publisher has cared enough to keep these great books in print.
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful.
The colourful world of British teenagers in 50's London
By Daniel J. Hamlow
MacInnes's novel, set in 1958, London, demonstrates the status of the teenager as a new economic class is demonstrated early on when the narrator tells us: "This teenage ball had had a real splendour in the days when kids discovered that for the first time since centuries of kingdom-come, they'd money, which had always been denied to us at the best time in life to use it, namely, when you're young and strong. ... it had a real savage splendour in the days when we found that no one couldn't sit on our faces anymore because we'd loot to spend at last, and our world was to be our world..."
The narrator is a free lance photographer who takes pictures of the night life and of anything depicting the new London and its denizens, hoping for an exhibition. He loves jazz music, is integrationist, and against class. He lives in a slum named Napoli because he enjoys the low rent and how he is accepted, no matter what he does, and no one questions his background, educated or class. He wouldn't be treated that way in Belgravia, the fashionable, upscale district of London.
He has a bunch of interesting friends, such as the very friendly Fabulous Hoplife, who swings the other way, and the Wiz, a huckster who wants to make it into the bigtime, realizing there's a goldmine with the economic prosperity and renewed London. He wants to get there via illegal means, much to the narrator's chagrin. There's Big Jill, a big and friendly les to whom the narrator confides to about Suze; she's kind of like an older sister to him.
But he's really after his dreamgirl Crepe Suzette, or Suze, a pretty girl who's getting her kicks by sleeping around with every black she fancies. He's very upset when she tells him she's getting married to Henley, a fashion designer in his forties for whom she's a secretary. "I'm marrying for distinction, and that's a thing that you could never give me," she tells him. Despite her importance, she's not one of the most interesting characters here.
But when the narrator learns of the racial tensions going on and reads an anti-immigrant tirade in a news article condemning the Commonwealth Act, which allowed emigration from the former colonies to the UK, he sadly says "I don't understand my country anymore. ...the English race has spread itself all over the world...No one invites us, and we didn't ask anyone's permission... Yet when a few hundred thousand come and settle among our fifty millions, we just can't take it."
The generation gap between three groups are interesting. There are people like the narrator, growing up when the war was already over, and thus progressive, anti-Empire, and accepting blacks and Indians. People like his oafish stepbrother Verne and Ed the Ted, in their mid-twenties, lived through the war, were more patriotic, pro-Empire, and are spiteful of teenagers. And people like the narrator's father like the 1950's because they lived through the hell of the 1930's, unable to find good work, starving, and seeing the war as a godsend for the employment opportunities.
MacInnes's historical novel is a look at a post-war Britain, defanged of its empire, and having experienced a political faux-pas in the Suez Crisis. It also examines race relations in Britain ten years after the Commonwealth Act, and how British commercialism got roaring with the newfound prosperity. The tensions between whites and coloureds came to a head in the Notting Hill race riot, which takes place in this book. The movie that was adapted from this cut out most of the thoughtful parts of the book, but it's one of my favourite movies, and I see this book in a new light.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
If you liked Quadrophenia you'll (probably) like this
By Privacy, Please
Like many young Americans, I read this book because David Bowie was involved with making it into a movie and because the British band The Jam had a record called "Absolute Beginners". I thought it would be an interesting peep into British mod culture. As others have pointed out, the culture in the book is a little bit "pre-Mod" in that it appears to be set a few years prior to "Quadrophenia." Yet, the youthful narrator of the book, who is the "mod" type, is still definitely distinct in his style and political views from Teddy boys as personified by "Ed the Ted." He is portrayed as just young enough to have missed most of the WWII hardships, unlike his father and some others in the book who have been worn down and scarred by that baggage.
Unlike the majority of British movies and books that are set in the 50s, this book is remarkably optimistic. The nameless narrator has money to spend, colorful friends (including a stylish gay party boy and an ex-debutante) to have fun with, and an open mind towards new developments such as the influx of immigrants and people of color into his geographic space. In contrast to his hidebound elders he's pretty ebullient, and the only blot on his horizon has to do with his teenage girlfriend Suze, who cheats on him with blacks (which interestingly, doesn't turn the narrator's attitude negative towards them - he's truly primed for the upcoming free love generation) and then informs him she's marrying someone else. The book isn't much of a story, more a stream-of-consciousness narration of our hero hopping from a wild party, to a conversation with his father, to an attempt to patch things up with Suze, and so forth and so on. The story thus zips from place to place much like the narrator does on a scooter.
Incidentally, the book isn't much like the movie, which cut out most of the racial and political elements. This doesn't surprise me since if you're an American reader who hasn't majored in modern British history, you're probably going to need to resort to Wikipedia every chapter or so, to have a clue what the heck the author is talking about. This is the main reason why I didn't give it five stars - it really needs a glossary since the narrator clearly is a busy guy who doesn't have time for lengthy 'splainin'. Also, the ending of the book was kind of weird and left me feeling like the narrator really needs to get a prescription for his ADD sometime soon. It's still a breezy fun read, full of colorful slang. I just don't recommend it for "absolute beginners" who have zero knowledge of 50s Britain - they may lose patience fast.
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