Alexei Sayle shares his story of growing up in Liverpool. The book is packed with humour, and much to learn from his experience of postwar austerity, reconstruction, British history, communism, continental holidays, and days at the seaside. For me, born a few years later and growing up in the North West, it was trip down memory lane. I visited many of the same places and enjoyed some similar experiences.
Humble Beginnings
The book opens with young Alexei desperate to see Bambi at the cinema. We are introduced to Molly, his quick-tempered Jewish mother, and his father, Joe, a mild-mannered railway guard. They had married in secret, as Molly’s family would have banished her for marrying a non-Jew. Both were dedicated to the communist cause, so simply would not take him to see anything made by Walt Disney, who had been “an enthusiastic supporter” of the witch hunts against communists in the US (p.3). Instead, his parents took him to see Alexander Nevsky (1938), with its scenes of child sacrifice.
George Orwell’s name was also spoken with venom, along with those of Churchill, J. Edgar Hoover, and Hitler. Molly and Joe both knew George Garrett, who founded the Unity Theatre in Liverpool. Garrett had befriended and housed Orwell while he worked on The Road to Wigan Pier, but the lack of an acknowledgement of Garrett in the book and, later, the criticism of how Homage to Catalonia portrayed the left, cemented their dislike.
When TV arrived, both parents would be found yelling “lies!” and “propaganda!” whenever the news came on (p.36). Their telephone was first installed on a party line shared with a neighbour. Molly and Joe never had a problem with people hearing their conversations as they always assumed that the state was listening in, but if Molly ever wanted to make a call when the line was in use, she would yell down the phone asking her neighbour to hurry up.
Like any child, Alexei followed the example of his parents, and challenged views that were not his own. One day, after the school milk had been handed out, Miss Wilson asked the class to give God thanks for the milk. Alexei piped up:
“No, Miss Wilson, I think you’ll find that the milk comes to us via the Milk Marketing Board, a public body set up in 1933 to control the production, pricing, and distribution of milk and other dairy products within the UK. It has nothing to do with the intervention of some questionable divine entity.” (p.42)
Union man
Joe was heavily involved in the union, spending much of his spare time on union business and eventually becoming regional secretary. He took full advantage of the free travel passes that would take his family away with him.
Abroad, Joe would instantly connect with the local railway workers, who welcomed him and his family, giving them access to staff facilities when needed. One summer saw them spending their holiday in Czechoslovakia. After an overnight rail journey across Europe sleeping in a couchette, they arrived at a deserted campsite only to discover that they were not expected. Joe had written confirming they had booked and expressing an interest in meeting other union members during their stay. After spending a miserable night under canvas, Joe found a union building and was welcomed by many who had spent the war years in Oldham, Warrington, and Stockport. Embarrassed to learn that Joe’s letters had gone unanswered, they arranged a hotel for the family in Prague and a guide to take them around the sights. They returned to Liverpool laden with gifts of Bohemian glass.
Joe’s union work took the family to various seaside resorts for conferences. There, the families often had free or cheap tickets to local attractions, but Molly and Alexei would rather explore places by themselves.
“Why would we want to look at Vanbrugh façade… or a Palladian portico when we knew what had paid for it was slavery, exploitation and genocide?” (p.125)
“Big School”
As Alexei moved on to Alsop Grammar school, re-development was underway across Liverpool. Terraced houses were bulldozed and blocks of flats and shopping centres rose around the outskirts of the city. Joe became the victim of a botched surgical procedure and won a considerable sum in compensation, with which they bought a boat, the cause of much embarrassment and humour.
Alexei came home from school with many revelations. On discovering the power of swearing he tried it out on Molly, who took a moment before replying with interest and thereafter saw no reason to control her language at home. Almost at the end of his time at school, he discovered that Jewish students were allowed to arrive late and miss the morning assembly. Denied years of lie-ins, he challenged Molly about why the school hadn’t been told he was Jewish and was rebuffed with “I didn’t want you to be left out” (p.224). At school, his behaviour got progressively more outrageous and in 1968 he would pass just four O Levels.
Through the Marxist-Leninist Group (MLG), Alexei got to know the world of Liverpool’s radical pubs. He also joined the MLG theory classes to work through communist literature and some lighter classics, such as The Ragged Trousered Philanthropist.
As the war in Vietnam raged, Joe and Molly became active supporters of Merseyside Medical Aid for Vietnam, with Molly becoming secretary. Lin Qui, the representative of the Vietcong in Europe, became a frequent visitor to their home. Molly also organised an art show with local sculptor Arthur Dooley to raise money for the charity. Dooley’s work can be seen in both the Metropolitan and Anglican Cathedrals in Liverpool. For Alexei, the downside was that his parents would often organise fundraising events at the same pubs he visited.
Animal Farm
During his final years at school, he became more questioning of Joe and Molly’s communist views, more so after reading Orwell’s Animal Farm for A Level English. He found that the book was:
“… all about me and my family and the thing that we believed in”. (p.278)
He knew exactly who Orwell based his characters on, while most of his fellow students had no idea. When he expressed his enthusiasm for the book at home, all Molly could respond with was her loathing for Orwell. The penny dropped and he saw that:
“,,,they only wanted to listen to messages that confirmed the things they already believed in written by authors who were ideologically pure”. (p. 280)
In the end, he did not take his A Levels. Following various incidents at school, including fighting with a teacher, he was told not to come back.
There is much in this book about life growing up in the shadow of the second world war. The story is honest, brutal, and hilarious, and I’m now looking forward to reading the next volume, Thatcher Stole My Trousers.
Thanks as ever to the Kingswood and Wotton Socialist book club for picking it.
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