Paul Torday’s third novel continues with his familiar literary style, blending elements of the ghost story into an engaging psychological study of a man losing his grip on the world. Chapters are narrated by a man and his wife, the former sinking into a strange perception of reality whilst the latter attempts to make sense of what’s happening to him.
Michael and Elizabeth have a rather dull marriage, one where the prospect of a new sudoku puzzle is the pinnacle of excitement. Comfortably well off, Michael only dabbles in work and administers a “gentleman’s club”, a rather old fashioned establishment that hasn’t really changed much, and hasn’t wanted to, since the days of the Empire. Michael also owns a run down country pile in Scotland, convenient for hunting trips, although somewhat inhospitable. All a dull premise for a novel perhaps, until Michael begins to change…
The novel begins with Michael and Elizabeth on holiday in Ireland, where Michael spots an arresting painting on a landing where they are staying. He sees, or thinks he sees, a woman in the picture and later begins to meet the same strange woman, although it becomes clear that nobody else can see her. Elizabeth notices a change in Michael in that he is no longer the dull and almost lifeless man she’s been married to for ten years. To her surprise (and growing horror), she discovers that her husband has been taking anti-psychotic drugs; he’s decided to stop taking them resulting in delusions, erratic behaviour and hallucinatory episodes.
The Girl on the Landing works very well with its shared narration; Torday only slowly and carefully allows the reader to realise that something isn’t quite right with Michael. Similarly, he writes very well from the point of view of a woman, and the two remain distinct and individual throughout. Elizabeth’s growing unease is also handled very well. What lets it down is that it is somewhat overlong. At a hundred pages less this would be a very tight and effective read. Like Torday’s previous book, The Irresistible Inheritance of Wilberforce, this one outstays its welcome.
Torday also takes a few dangerous risks with this novel. The reader must accept that Elizabeth is totally unaware of Michael’s past (he is nearly placed in an institution as a child) and that he has been on medication for the whole of his adult life. The reader must also accept Torday’s understanding of schizophrenia, which is sketchy to say the least, and the shock revelations that come later in the book about the deaths of Michael’s parents. The link between the Empire mentality of the gentleman’s club, Michael’s “refreshed” outlook on the world and how it links to him an a possible evolutionary anomaly doesn’t quite fit together that neatly either.
Perhaps I was expecting more of a ghost story, and certainly this is how the opening chapter appears to set things up, although things unfortunately don’t go in the direction of a recent (and much better) book about a ghostly painting, Susan Hill’s The Man in the Picture. The Girl on the Landing is still worth reading, especially for the ending which, although not particularly original, was certainly a satisfactory one. But of course you could do one better and read the Susan Hill novel instead.
Anarchy in the UK: The World of David Peace
For dark, disturbing and complex fiction I prescribe David Peace. I’ve recently completed a mammoth reading session comprising of the four Red Riding novels. 1974, 1977, 1980 and 1983. The books require sequential and successive reading because they span an interlinking series of crimes and characters, moving back and forth over the years and switching between a variety of first person narratives. Dealing with police corruption, injustice and brutal murder, the novels are at times very disturbing, but Peace is an incredibly intelligent writer worth attention.
The four novels were recently turned into three television films by Channel 4, and I have already written about the adaptation of the first novel. Channel 4 changed quite a lot, so I’m concentrating on the novels only from hereon. And if you’ve seen the tv versions and thought them grim and harrowing then look away now, Peace’s original novels are far bleaker and far less straightforward in their construction.
1974 sets the scene for events that will echo throughout the books and across the years. The murder of a child and the (possibly wrong) incarceration of Michael Myshkin, a mentally disabled man; bent coppers and drunken journalists, seeds of corruption in Yorkshire slowly being uncovered. The novel is told from the perspective of Edward Dunford, a reporter who seals the novel’s close with unexpected events. 1974 is great reading but somewhat undisciplined, Peace finding his feet in his first novel.
1977 picks up the story with a dual narration from two of the previous novel’s minor characters and is a maturer piece, although possibly darker still in tone. Jack Whitehead (a former colleague of Dunford) and Bob Fraser (a policeman) are similar voices fearing similar demons and it becomes difficult at times to tell them apart, and there is a jarring and almost surreal scene when they briefly meet. 1977 begins to merge with real events as a series of attacks on prostitutes are linked to a “Yorkshire Ripper” (a name coined by Whitehead) and continues leading the reader into a brutally hellish world.
The third book, 1980, is narrated by Peter Hunter, an officer brought into the Ripper investigation to uncover the incompetency of the Yorkshire police in handling the case. 1980 is the most conventional of the series so far, taking it easy on the stream of consciousness and dreamlike narrative that at times threatened to swamp the first two novels. Hunter begins to uncover more of the background to the crimes of 1974-1980, realising that the face of the law is no less corrupt or depraved than the man they are seeking. It’s a strong allegation from Peace, but 1980 is a brilliant achievement. Although Hunter is a flawed character, I found his voice almost addictive. When his world begins to crumble it’s compelling and faultless writing. 1980 is the most unusual of the series in how it directly references real murder cases, providing a grim link in the timline between Hindley and Sutcliffe. Incidentally, however, Peace chooses to change the name of The Yorkshire Ripper and allows himself to blur fact and fiction and avoid recrimination. Similarly, the Michael Myshkin character reminds of the tragic case of Stefan Kishko, the Rochdale man wrongly imprisoned for many years.
1983 concludes the series by attempting to bring all of the multiple threads together. John Pigott is a lawyer representing Michael Myshkin’s appeal. Maurice Jobson, a senior policeman, and “B.J” ,a shadowy figure who has appeared throughout the series, share the narrative that switches as far back as 1969 as the story unfolds further. 1983, the longest novel in the series, at first appears to be the most lucid, although it’s almost if this book is haunted by its predecessors and begins to slip into vague and staccato type narrative as the ghosts refuse to fade. This novel is possibly the cleverest in the series, and exploits the reader’s familiarity with the story by placing new characters in old settings. Pigott and Jobson visit locations eerily familiar from the earlier books; the missing halves of previous conversations are finally heard. Peace also delights in repetitive narrative, further hammering his imagery home.
After finishing the Red Riding series I was still confused, but rather that Peace not giving all of the answers I do think they are there; it’s just that he makes the conclusion and his smattering of clues hard for the reader. This is a difficult and exhausting body of work to take on but ultimately a very satisfying one. It’s bold and challenging crime fiction. You’ll really read nothing else like it.
The Day the Earth Caught Fire
With a title like The Day the Earth Caught Fire you’d be forgiven for thinking that this 1961 movie was pure Hollywood, following other such titles as When Worlds Collide, The Day the Earth Stood Still and George Pal’s H.G. Wells adaptations War of the Worlds and The Time Machine. The kind of film that Hollywood enjoys remaking with the likes of Tom Cruise and Keanu Reeves. The Day the Earth Caught Fire is actually British through and through, shot in London by Val Guest and starring Leo McKern, Janet Munro and Edward Judd.
Despite this being an at times laughably low budget film, The Day the Earth Caught Fire deals with a subject that’s still a topic today. Global warming, drought, heatwaves and especially flooding. More than thirty years before The Environment Agency! But being 1961 the biggest issue here is the nuclear rather than the environmental one, and the film deals with the aftermath of secret nuclear tests that result in the tilt in the Earth’s axis being altered slightly. Slight, but enough to cause heatwave, cyclones and flooding. Especially in London.
Most of the film centres around Fleet Street, with McKern and Judd playing two seasoned journalists who try to make sense of it all as the heat cranks up. They open windows, put on fans and loosen their ties. They head for the local pub but it has run out of ice cold lager (although by all accounts warm beer was the usual thing in those days anyway). Along comes Janet Munro as a sort of Judd love interest, the girl from the ministry who reveals what’s been going on behind closed nuclear bunkers. It’s a scoop that sends the world reeling again.
The supporting actors include Bernard Braden, Peter Butterworth, Reginal Beckwith (from Night of the Demon) and John Barron (best known as CJ in The Fall and Rise Reginald Perrin). There’s also a walk on from a pre-fame Michael Caine, who plays a helpful policeman. The most bizarre casting in the film, an experiment that almost pays off, is Arthur Christiansen. Here the real life editor of the Daily Express plays the onscreen editor of the Daily Express. It’s a brave move for authenticity, and Christiansen tries his best, although he just doesn’t hack it as an actor. All he can do is memorise his lines accurately, which he manages admirably. But when he’s up against Leo McKern (whose axis is tilted in the direction of ham acting), he doesn’t stand a chance.
Although Leo McKern and Janet Munro are given top billing, the real star of The Day the Earth Caught Fire is Edward Judd. For a short period in the 60s Judd was the great hope of British science fiction cinema. He also appeared with Lionel Jeffries in H.G. Wells’ First Men in the Moon (1964) and the now rarely seen film from Merton Park Studios Invasion (1965). Sadly, his career quickly petered out, although his other key films from the sixties are Island of Terror (1966) with Peter Cushing and one of the She franchise, The Vengeance of She (1968). After that he was relegated to supporting roles in the likes of The Sweeney and The Professionals and is possibly best known for the Think Bike! public information films from the mid 70s. Sadder still, Judd died in February of this year, and there were several internet rumours (although unfounded) that he’d ended up living homeless in South London.
Although usually always given corny scripts, Judd was a very decent actor – especially so here. He plays the disillusioned and semi-alcoholic journalist extremely well, and I think he effortlessly outshines McKern, who is over mannered in this film. I’m not sure about Janet Munro either; she isn’t given much in the way of inspired dialogue, but is featured in one or two semi-clothed scenes that the 1961 critics probably thought “steamy”, although the bed sheets are always strategically arranged.
As stated, much of the film is low budget, with the “disaster” footage suspiciously looking like it’s culled from newsreels, although the more memorable and effective scenes are the simplest. The newspaper men crowded around the sweaty office, the distant loudspeaker broadcasts from the sober Prime Minister (sounding very much like Harold Macmillan), and Judd pushing through jazzy end-of-the-world street parties to get back to Munro’s flat. Best of all though is the opening and closing scenes of the film that are filmed in sepia, where Judd claws back his credibility as a journalist in the now deserted capital.
Another key scene of The Day the Earth Caught Fire comes at the very end, where the Daily Express printroom boys are poised with two alternate front pages of the next edition. One reads World Saved, the other World Doomed. A further set of risky nuclear detonations are scheduled in a bid to set the Earth back on its course, but the film ends vaguely and we’re left without an answer. In the days when the nuclear threat was a very real one, it looks like the audience were deliberately left with an air of uncertainty.
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