Author Archives: James

About James

James specialises in digital literary heritage projects. He spends most of his time in front of a computer screen writing about life instead of living it. Therefore, do not trust a word he says.

50th anniversary of The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner

Posted on by

Theatrical release poster at Wikipedia.

This year marks the fiftieth anniversary of Karel Reisz’s film adaptation of The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner. I’d originally planned to celebrate this by running the Great North Run with Tony Roe and then stopping at the finishing line and reading the story out aloud. A bit dramatic, but that’s the kind of thing you have to resort to when you’re trying to raise the profile of a voluntary organisation such as the Alan Sillitoe Committee. However, these plans were scuppered when I got the commission for The Space which has dominated the last six months of my life. It had nothing to do with laziness. ..

Loneliness was the title of Sillitoe’s second publication, a collection of short stories that also contains two other classics in Uncle Ernest and On Saturday Afternoon. I first read Loneliness in my late teens, which was probably the best time as I, like Colin Smith, was trying to figure out my place in the world. I still am. Through Colin Smith I learned that respect was something that was earned rather than a given and that it was alright to question authority, morals that have stayed with me throughout my life.

It was with great excitement, then, and a little trepidation, that I made my way to the Playhouse to see Roy Williams adaptation. Tom Courtney is as synonymous with Colin Smith as Albert Finney is with Arthur Seaton and so this was no easy task. One way to resolve this problem was by casting a mixed-race kid (superbly played by Marcus Romer) against the backdrop of the 2011 riots, which has raised similar questions regarding class and youth. This was a clever move and worked well.

The play included snippets of speeches by David Cameron, a politician certainly for turning given that he went from hugging a hoodie to hanging them. The aftermath of the riots saw incredibly harsh and disproportionate sentences handed out, particularly those regarding social media. It demonstrated a government completely out of touch with large proportions of society.

I agree with Williams that the questions Sillitoe was asking about Britain, then, are still as relevant today. However, I differ with his emphasis on greed in the riots. He said “the riots last year seemed to be very different to the eighties; they seemed to be more about a chance to get their hands on new trainers or whatever. We have this ‘fast-food’ culture where we are made to want things we don’t need and can’t afford. I think that was definitely an issue in the riots last year, and in a way that made it more disturbing because there was no cause.” This emphasis on the ‘fast-food culture’ has influenced his interpretation of Sillitoe’s story and as a result I think it loses the rawness and anger of the original, as well as Smith’s cockiness in the face of authority. But as a contemporary reaction it works very well.

The riots were instinctive – a mixture of boredom, opportunism and apathy. This is why some rioters showed such a lack of ambition in the shops they attacked – something alluded to in the play. It was more about the thrill of smashing something up than profiteering. Sillitoe writes about this in The Ragman’s Daughter, when a young thief derives greater pleasure from dumping his loot in the Trent and hearing it splash than in possessing things. Is there any better criticism of consumer society?

Sillitoe’s depictions of working class life are so brutal that he’s been accused of hating his own. But truth has always caused offence. This was why David Cameron was so harsh on the rioters as they were an embarrassment to Brand Britain, making us no different to the Arab Springs. No regime change under my watch.

Sillitoe wrote in his essay Poor People: “Voting can never make any difference to their plight. It would take too long. They want to get out of it now, this minute, this week at the most. When you live from day to day, how can you believe anyone who says he will alter things in a few years? The years ahead are an empty desert, without landmarks of any kind, beyond the imagination. Poor people live in the present.” Colin Smith certainly lives in the present as did the rioters. It was a guttural reaction to a malignant and offensive political system and one that will return with greater fury when 80% of the cuts kick in next year.

Other stuff.

 

 

Sillitoe Day 27 October 2012

Posted on by

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fqdtStM5G4U

The Alan Sillitoe Committee is a voluntary organisation committed to raising awareness of one of Nottingham’s most prolific writers by putting on a series of events, the proceeds from which go towards a statue fund. Sillitoe Day is the biggest event in our calendar and falls every two years.

Our second Sillitoe Day is of particular significance as 2012 marks the 50th anniversary of The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner. It is also the 125th anniversary of Raleigh, the workplace of Sillitoe’s fictional anti-hero Arthur Seaton. The Committee will also be celebrating being one of 53 organisations commissioned to produce content for a new multimedia platform called The Space, and will launch the ‘Sillitoe Trail’. This is a unique Mobile Phone App that creates a literary walk through Sillitoe’s debut novel Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, visiting five key locations on its journey.

Sillitoe Day will be split into two sessions. The morning session (11-1) will see the launch of the Sillitoe Trail Mobile App which will be presented by Paul Fillingham and I. Paul has captured the 1950s aesthetic of the project through some beautiful visuals. He’s also the tech monkey, creating the Smart Phone App and generating the QR Codes etc. I’ve edited together the written content; selecting the writers and creating the narrative.

Ann Featherstone recording audio for the Mobile App at Paper-Stone studios

The morning session will examine five key locations from Saturday Night and Sunday Morning (Old Market Square, The White Horse, Raleigh, Trent and Goose Fair) with commissioned writers Al Needham, Derrick Buttress, Pete Davis, Ann Featherstone and me. There will also be videos from Alex ‘MotaMouf’ Young and Andrew ‘MulletProofPoet’ Graves and a short film from the British Film Council Collection called How a Bicycle is Made.

The afternoon session runs from 2 – 5 and is a more general celebration of Sillitoe’s work. It includes the launch of The Open Door, republished by Five Leaves; Sam Derby-Cooper will be showing his short film Mimic, based on Alan’s acclaimed short story, and the wonderful Frank Abbott will be previewing his special remix of Saturday Night and Sunday Morning . 

We’ve got two keynote speakers. Michael Eaton MBE will be exploring Sillitoe’s Nottinghamshire, basing his talk on the book of the same title that Alan produced with photographs from his son, David. William Ivory will be in conversation with Neil Fulwood about social realism, fresh from the success of his wonderful play Diary of a Football Nobody which is currently showing at the Playhouse. Closing comments will be from David Sillitoe.

Jane Streeter with her pen pal.

Sillitoe Day has also given us the opportunity to bring in two organisations who we treally admire. The Bookcase is an independent bookshop from Lowdham run by Jane Streeter, who was a long term pen pal of Alan’s. Eva from In Spades Design will also be selling her beautiful line drawings of Nottingham locations (my favourite is of the old Players factory) as well as mugs with quotes from Nottingham based culture (‘It’s thirsty work falling down stairs’)

Please support us by coming along and spreading the word. And if you can’t make it, get out a Sillitoe book from the library or download our Sillitoe Trail for free from The Space (available 27 October).

Other stuff.