0:00:12 > 0:00:21MUSIC: Rebel Rebel by David Bowie.
0:00:27 > 0:00:30Hello, and welcome to Books That Made Britain -
0:00:30 > 0:00:34books that capture the essence of the places where we live.
0:00:34 > 0:00:36I am here in the glorious DH Lawrence country
0:00:36 > 0:00:37and my home county, Nottinghamshire.
0:00:37 > 0:00:40I have chosen three excellent books.
0:00:40 > 0:00:43Each of these authors could be described as a working-class rebel.
0:00:43 > 0:00:45Furthermore, as a master storyteller.
0:00:45 > 0:00:48Here's what is coming up...
0:00:48 > 0:00:50A book that caused a sensation...
0:00:50 > 0:00:53"Don't let the BLEEP get you down."
0:00:53 > 0:00:56..and put the backstreets of Nottingham on the map.
0:00:56 > 0:00:58A funny, subversive, teenage diary tapped out on an old
0:00:58 > 0:01:01typewriter.
0:01:01 > 0:01:05Neither Sue nor I thought it might be big but it just exploded.
0:01:05 > 0:01:09It became an international multi-million bestseller.
0:01:09 > 0:01:14And a revolutionary story of life in the pits...
0:01:14 > 0:01:16It depicts that industrial close-knit community.
0:01:16 > 0:01:18..now rated as one of the best novels of
0:01:18 > 0:01:22all time.
0:01:22 > 0:01:26Before the end of the show I have the impossible task of having
0:01:26 > 0:01:29to pick a favourite from those three.
0:01:29 > 0:01:31We begin here in Nottingham with a novel that caused quite a
0:01:31 > 0:01:38stir when it was first published in 1958.
0:01:38 > 0:01:41Saturday Night And Sunday Morning by Alan Sillitoe.
0:01:41 > 0:01:45"I am me and nobody else.
0:01:45 > 0:01:51Whatever people think I am or say I am, that is what I am not
0:01:51 > 0:01:53because they don't know a bloody thing about me."
0:01:53 > 0:01:56It's the story of rebellious factory worker Arthur Seaton.
0:01:56 > 0:02:03A drinker, a fighter and a lover determined to win at whatever cost.
0:02:03 > 0:02:05Here, fighting the corner for Saturday Night And Sunday Morning,
0:02:05 > 0:02:09is local writer Nicky Monaghan.
0:02:09 > 0:02:11When I opened that book and read it for the first
0:02:11 > 0:02:14time when I was about 15, it was the first time I saw
0:02:14 > 0:02:17something in a book that I really recognised.
0:02:17 > 0:02:19It was a bit of a revolutionary moment
0:02:19 > 0:02:24because I thought, I can be a writer.
0:02:24 > 0:02:27I think Arthur Seaton's refusal to be defined.
0:02:27 > 0:02:30He is rebellious but if you ever called
0:02:30 > 0:02:33him a rebel, he would say, no, you do not know who I am.
0:02:33 > 0:02:43That is typical of a Nottingham mentality.
0:02:44 > 0:02:46Like Arthur, Alan Sillitoe his creator, never liked being labelled.
0:02:46 > 0:02:50# Magic moments...
0:02:50 > 0:02:53He would say, I am no Arthur Seaton but he
0:02:53 > 0:02:55certainly knew plenty of him.
0:02:59 > 0:03:09Raised in Radford, a close-knit working-class community
0:03:09 > 0:03:11in Nottingham, he simply called himself an observer.
0:03:11 > 0:03:13"It was my home ground that surrounded me with an
0:03:13 > 0:03:19intensity and integrity that no other place has been able to gice."
0:03:19 > 0:03:21On leaving school, he began working at
0:03:21 > 0:03:24Raleigh Bikes.
0:03:24 > 0:03:27"It was with a sense of wonder and adventure that I went to
0:03:27 > 0:03:30work in a factory at 14.
0:03:30 > 0:03:32I didn't want to go but I was resigned to it."
0:03:32 > 0:03:39The shop floor spoke and the young Alan listened.
0:03:39 > 0:03:41I should say repetition work without good mates around
0:03:41 > 0:03:42you could be very, very boring.
0:03:42 > 0:03:46Roll on 4.30.
0:03:46 > 0:03:50One time I used to get satisfaction out of it but it becomes
0:03:50 > 0:03:51a matter of routine now.
0:03:51 > 0:03:53Best part of the week?
0:03:53 > 0:03:57Friday, mostly.
0:03:57 > 0:03:59The idea of going to work in the factory
0:03:59 > 0:04:04held no fears for me.
0:04:04 > 0:04:07Being given my own place to work at 17 was
0:04:07 > 0:04:07a big step up.
0:04:07 > 0:04:12On the playground and now in the factory I daydreamed
0:04:12 > 0:04:14and fixed the faces, habits and histories
0:04:14 > 0:04:15of the people around me in
0:04:15 > 0:04:16my mind.
0:04:16 > 0:04:19Almost without realising it.
0:04:19 > 0:04:22Certainly not knowing the use I would one day put it to.
0:04:22 > 0:04:24It would lead to the creation of a book that
0:04:24 > 0:04:29caused a sensation and a character called Arthur Seaton.
0:04:29 > 0:04:32"Factories sweat you to death, labour exchanges
0:04:32 > 0:04:34talk you to death.
0:04:34 > 0:04:36Insurance and income tax officers milk money from
0:04:36 > 0:04:37your wage packets and rob you to death.
0:04:37 > 0:04:39If you are still left with a
0:04:39 > 0:04:42tiny bit of life in your guts after, the army calls you up
0:04:42 > 0:04:46and you get shot to death."
0:04:46 > 0:04:48Saturday Night and Sunday Morning was revolutionary.
0:04:48 > 0:04:50The stories of everyday people and their lives
0:04:50 > 0:04:53had never been told before with such gritty realism.
0:04:53 > 0:04:57He wrote very honestly.
0:04:57 > 0:05:01It wasn't confected, it was from the heart.
0:05:01 > 0:05:04I think when we look back over 20, 30, 40,50 years
0:05:04 > 0:05:06this is one of the peaks.
0:05:06 > 0:05:08This is one of the great British novels that,
0:05:08 > 0:05:12I think, obviously came at exactly the right time.
0:05:12 > 0:05:15It connected with people deeply and made difference.
0:05:20 > 0:05:22Much of the city David's father new and captured on the
0:05:22 > 0:05:29page has disappeared.
0:05:29 > 0:05:34But the memories of factory workers who knew David's father and
0:05:34 > 0:05:36lived in the real world of Saturday night and Sunday morning
0:05:36 > 0:05:39remain as fresh as ever.
0:05:39 > 0:05:42Work was hard and it was dull and it was boring and it was
0:05:42 > 0:05:46repetitive and it was...
0:05:46 > 0:05:48It was a means.
0:05:48 > 0:05:51It was a means to the Friday night.
0:05:51 > 0:05:54You used to just have fun.
0:05:54 > 0:05:59Rock 'n' roll music in the street.
0:05:59 > 0:06:01If somebody was playing it, you stood there and jived.
0:06:01 > 0:06:06You did not care who was watching.
0:06:06 > 0:06:08If you spoke from anybody from Radford at my age,
0:06:08 > 0:06:10they would all say they
0:06:10 > 0:06:12the same thing.
0:06:12 > 0:06:15The story was exactly as we lived it, or wanted to live it.
0:06:15 > 0:06:18# Good golly, Miss Molly.
0:06:18 > 0:06:20You live for the weekend.
0:06:20 > 0:06:23You live for Friday and Saturday.
0:06:23 > 0:06:30You blew everything.
0:06:30 > 0:06:33"The rowdy gang of singers who sat at the scattered tables, saw
0:06:33 > 0:06:37Arthur walk unsteadily to the head of the stairs.
0:06:37 > 0:06:40I know they must have known he was dead drunk and seen the
0:06:40 > 0:06:42danger he would soon be in.
0:06:42 > 0:06:44No one attempted to talk to him and lead
0:06:44 > 0:06:51him back to his seat."
0:06:51 > 0:06:59He drank to excess.
0:06:59 > 0:07:00He absolutely drank to excess.
0:07:00 > 0:07:03"With 11 pints of beer and seven small gins
0:07:03 > 0:07:08playing hide and seek inside his stomach, he fell
0:07:08 > 0:07:09from the topmost stair to the bottom."
0:07:09 > 0:07:12# Good golly, Miss Molly.
0:07:12 > 0:07:17If they weren't at the pub, they were in the bookies.
0:07:17 > 0:07:23There were lots of Arthur Seatons.
0:07:23 > 0:07:32"Piled up passions were exploded on Saturday night and the
0:07:32 > 0:07:34affect of a week's graft graft in the factory was swilled
0:07:34 > 0:07:39out of your system in a burst of goodwill."
0:07:39 > 0:07:41If you were at it, so to speak.
0:07:41 > 0:07:44You were found out, you could not say, that is it then, we are
0:07:44 > 0:07:45separated now.
0:07:45 > 0:07:47I am going to live somewhere else.
0:07:47 > 0:07:48There was nowhere to go.
0:07:48 > 0:07:51Particularly the lady of the house.
0:07:51 > 0:07:58If she got caught, she had to live with the consequences.
0:07:58 > 0:08:07There were quite a few fat lips, weren't there?
0:08:07 > 0:08:09If you go back to the reviews and the response
0:08:09 > 0:08:11of the critics at the time, they
0:08:11 > 0:08:15were knocked out by the veracity and the authenticity of it.
0:08:15 > 0:08:18A lot of the writing at that time was almost
0:08:18 > 0:08:21semidetached from the environment and the social context.
0:08:21 > 0:08:25Alan was true to his word.
0:08:25 > 0:08:26I think that made it, not autobiographical, but
0:08:26 > 0:08:29authentic.
0:08:29 > 0:08:32That was its power.
0:08:32 > 0:08:35Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, it actually give us an identity
0:08:35 > 0:08:37because it went national.
0:08:37 > 0:08:39It made us feel as though we were important
0:08:39 > 0:08:41people to have lived around there.
0:08:41 > 0:08:48That's how it made us feel.
0:08:48 > 0:08:50The book remains powerful and resonated with
0:08:50 > 0:08:56the next generation of readers.
0:08:56 > 0:09:00There was a scene on the estate where my Grandma lived and all of
0:09:00 > 0:09:03these places that I knew and I couldn't believe that someone had
0:09:03 > 0:09:06written a book and put these places that I knew in a book.
0:09:06 > 0:09:09It just changed my whole view of what literature was.
0:09:09 > 0:09:12Arthur's really interesting because he is not a socialist.
0:09:12 > 0:09:16He is anti-everything.
0:09:16 > 0:09:18He is, whoever you are, you're after doing me down and
0:09:18 > 0:09:25I'm not going to be defined by you.
0:09:25 > 0:09:27He isn't into the union, but he hates the bosses.
0:09:27 > 0:09:29"Me, all I am out for is a good time.
0:09:29 > 0:09:31All the rest is propaganda."
0:09:31 > 0:09:38Author Seaton is the kind of person that my grandma would
0:09:38 > 0:09:42have said got the cheek of the devil.
0:09:42 > 0:09:45Nikki met her hero and even got to know him a little before he
0:09:45 > 0:09:46died in 2010.
0:09:46 > 0:09:48She says he remained a defiant character.
0:09:48 > 0:09:51He was a man of quiet rebellion.
0:09:51 > 0:09:54I think it was definitely part of him.
0:09:54 > 0:09:59"Once a rebel, always a rebel."
0:09:59 > 0:10:02I was at school here when I first read our next book.
0:10:02 > 0:10:07It made a real impression.
0:10:07 > 0:10:13I was a little bit older than our hero, he was 13 3/4.
0:10:13 > 0:10:15The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole really struck a chord.
0:10:15 > 0:10:22It was funny, smart and subversive.
0:10:22 > 0:10:24"I've realised I've never seen a dead body.
0:10:24 > 0:10:27Or a real female nipple.
0:10:27 > 0:10:31This is what comes with living in a cul-de-sac."
0:10:31 > 0:10:34A classic line there from Adrian Mole, which is set here
0:10:34 > 0:10:38in Leicester.
0:10:38 > 0:10:41I am on Atley Way just, outside the library about to
0:10:41 > 0:10:42meet local writer Bali Rai.
0:10:42 > 0:10:47It's a library Sue Townsend knew and loved.
0:10:47 > 0:10:50Choosing to voice her opinions and her thoughts through the eyes of
0:10:50 > 0:10:53Adrian, a narcissistic teenager, that was pretty clever.
0:10:53 > 0:10:58It is wonderful because you can say stuff
0:10:58 > 0:11:01that you want to say and touch on things that aren't quite your
0:11:01 > 0:11:02viewpoints.
0:11:02 > 0:11:05In a really, really easy and clever way.
0:11:05 > 0:11:09Also, teenagers are so earnest about the world.
0:11:09 > 0:11:12When I fell in love for the first time, no one had
0:11:12 > 0:11:14been in love like that before.
0:11:14 > 0:11:17Adrian does that with Pandora and everything else is very earnest
0:11:17 > 0:11:18and real.
0:11:18 > 0:11:25He feels it deeply.
0:11:25 > 0:11:29Bali was aged around 10 3/4 when he first
0:11:29 > 0:11:34read Secret Diary and it had a massive impact.
0:11:34 > 0:11:38The book was huge.
0:11:38 > 0:11:40It was the first time I ever considered that I could possibly
0:11:40 > 0:11:45become an author.
0:11:45 > 0:11:48I had also was wanted to be one and dreamt of it because
0:11:48 > 0:11:50of the likes of Roald Dahl, CS Lewis and stuff.
0:11:50 > 0:11:52They were untouchable.
0:11:52 > 0:11:55Sue Townsend was a woman from my city whose kids had come
0:11:55 > 0:11:58from my school and others.
0:11:58 > 0:12:01They were people who were every day and she was
0:12:01 > 0:12:03writing about the neighbours.
0:12:03 > 0:12:05There were even Asian characters in the book.
0:12:05 > 0:12:07Something quite extraordinary at that time.
0:12:07 > 0:12:09"At the end of the tea, Mr Singh
0:12:09 > 0:12:11made a speech about how great it was to be British.
0:12:11 > 0:12:17Everyone cheered and sang Land of Hope and Glory.
0:12:17 > 0:12:21But only Mr Singh knew all of the words."
0:12:21 > 0:12:24Leicester is the most multi-racial city in the UK.
0:12:24 > 0:12:28The idea that there was a Mr Singh character, especially
0:12:28 > 0:12:32for me from a Sikh background, was a massive factor.
0:12:32 > 0:12:38In the clip he is the only person in that room that
0:12:38 > 0:12:41knows all the world to Land of Hope and Glory.
0:12:41 > 0:12:43There was no other faces like Mr Singh.
0:12:43 > 0:12:43He was a revelation.
0:12:43 > 0:12:46It was like seeing a member of my own
0:12:46 > 0:12:47family in the book.
0:12:47 > 0:12:48Today, he is fulfilling a lifelong ambition.
0:12:48 > 0:12:53He has come to the University of
0:12:53 > 0:12:57Leicester library's special collections department.
0:12:57 > 0:12:59Here they look after the entire Sue Townsend archive.
0:12:59 > 0:13:02This is the original manuscript of the Secret Diary of
0:13:02 > 0:13:03Adrian Mole.
0:13:03 > 0:13:04This is...
0:13:04 > 0:13:05It is stunning.
0:13:05 > 0:13:07It is stunning to be able to see this.
0:13:07 > 0:13:08For this book, there is
0:13:08 > 0:13:10just one draft manuscript and this is it.
0:13:10 > 0:13:17It is astonishing.
0:13:17 > 0:13:19It is like our Magna Carta or Shakespeare's
0:13:19 > 0:13:20first folio.
0:13:20 > 0:13:23There are a couple of things that you might notice on that
0:13:23 > 0:13:24front page.
0:13:24 > 0:13:27He is called Nigel Mole and he is 14 and three quarters.
0:13:27 > 0:13:29He is indeed.
0:13:29 > 0:13:32It is hard to describe because when I was 11,
0:13:32 > 0:13:3712, I used to
0:13:37 > 0:13:40sit and reading the books and I used to wonder how Sue wrote them.
0:13:40 > 0:13:41What did they look like?
0:13:41 > 0:13:44What did they actually do?
0:13:44 > 0:13:46I have just been
0:13:46 > 0:13:48smiling since I saw it.
0:13:48 > 0:13:55The name was changed on the advice of the BBC and
0:13:55 > 0:13:58her publisher to avoid comparison with Nigel Molesworth, a fictional
0:13:58 > 0:13:59schoolboy.
0:13:59 > 0:14:01It is a real snapshot of a particular time
0:14:01 > 0:14:02and this idea that you are
0:14:02 > 0:14:06almost hovering over her shoulder and I can almost imagine her sitting
0:14:06 > 0:14:10there doing it, maybe listening to the radio telling the kids to be
0:14:10 > 0:14:11quiet or whatever.
0:14:11 > 0:14:17It is an astonishing feeling.
0:14:17 > 0:14:19If we go on through the manuscript, it starts to get a
0:14:19 > 0:14:23little bit scrappy and this is very typical of how she wrote during this
0:14:23 > 0:14:24part of her career.
0:14:24 > 0:14:26These block capital letters, lots of crossing
0:14:26 > 0:14:28out, revisions.
0:14:28 > 0:14:35Lots of notes and revisions.
0:14:35 > 0:14:40This man, Sue Townsend's husband, was actually in the kitchen
0:14:40 > 0:14:42trying to read that manuscript and prepare
0:14:42 > 0:14:45it for the publisher.
0:14:45 > 0:14:48She couldn't type.
0:14:48 > 0:14:51I had to type it.
0:14:51 > 0:14:54I can't type either, but I can type with one hand.
0:14:56 > 0:15:00It was done on a really old type-writer, not a computer,
0:15:00 > 0:15:05and when you made a mistake you had to Tipp-Ex it out.
0:15:05 > 0:15:06That was a slow process, wasn't it?
0:15:07 > 0:15:11I read it for the first time as a whole book as I was typing it.
0:15:11 > 0:15:14Neither Sue nor I thought it would be big, but the publisher
0:15:14 > 0:15:16was quite happy with it.
0:15:16 > 0:15:19And it just exploded.
0:15:19 > 0:15:22It became a huge bestseller, all over the world, translated
0:15:22 > 0:15:27into 30 different languages.
0:15:27 > 0:15:30The book also spawned a radio show, a TV series and even,
0:15:30 > 0:15:36most recently, a musical.
0:15:36 > 0:15:39# Everyone will know the tap, it'll put me on the map.
0:15:39 > 0:15:44# What a piece of poetry.
0:15:44 > 0:15:46The vanity and self obsession of Adrian was a gift
0:15:46 > 0:15:49for illustrator Caroline Holden.
0:15:49 > 0:15:52One of the things I thought of initially was to have a mirror
0:15:52 > 0:15:56where the writing was done in the steam, so I think I stood
0:15:56 > 0:15:58in the flat where I was living, steaming up the window
0:15:58 > 0:16:00and writing on it.
0:16:00 > 0:16:02I never wanted to draw Adrian.
0:16:02 > 0:16:06Cos I had him in my head and I know with books, when you're reading
0:16:06 > 0:16:08them, and it's a character that's quite strong,
0:16:08 > 0:16:12I don't necessarily want to have that person drawn.
0:16:12 > 0:16:14My skin's dead good.
0:16:14 > 0:16:22I think it must be a combination of being in love and...Lucozade.
0:16:22 > 0:16:24It was a dream job to have, really.
0:16:24 > 0:16:30It was just so full of fun, laughter, but also very serious,
0:16:30 > 0:16:32serious issues as well.
0:16:32 > 0:16:35It was a lovely job to have.
0:16:35 > 0:16:37Sue Townsend once said, "No amount of balsamic vinegar
0:16:37 > 0:16:43or Prada handbags will make me forget what it was like to be poor"
0:16:43 > 0:16:45and while the Secret Diary of Adrian Mole is achingly funny,
0:16:45 > 0:16:49it's also intensely political.
0:16:49 > 0:16:58MUSIC: Two Tribes by Frankie Goes To Hollywood.
0:16:59 > 0:17:02People sat on the fence, waiting to see which way this battle
0:17:02 > 0:17:04is going to go.
0:17:11 > 0:17:11It's very political.
0:17:11 > 0:17:13Sue was a socialist.
0:17:13 > 0:17:18And she makes that point loads of times.
0:17:18 > 0:17:20Didn't like Margaret Thatcher.
0:17:20 > 0:17:26None of us did.
0:17:26 > 0:17:28I'm not sure how I'll vote.
0:17:28 > 0:17:34Sometimes, I think Mrs Thatcher is a nice, kind sort of woman.
0:17:34 > 0:17:38Then, the next day, I see her on television
0:17:38 > 0:17:43and she frightens me rigid.
0:17:43 > 0:17:46She's got eyes like a psychotic killer, but a voice
0:17:46 > 0:17:48like a gentle person.
0:17:48 > 0:17:52It is a bit confusing.
0:17:52 > 0:17:55She was able to make very, very sharp commentary
0:17:55 > 0:18:01and observations about British society under Thatcher,
0:18:01 > 0:18:03during the 1980s, but in a warm-hearted and humorous way
0:18:03 > 0:18:06and I think the readership really connected to that.
0:18:06 > 0:18:13Start fighting and let's all get together.
0:18:20 > 0:18:23When she passed away, I think a lot of the coverage
0:18:23 > 0:18:26and certainly a lot of the articles about her kind of glossed over
0:18:26 > 0:18:30the fact that she was a rebel.
0:18:30 > 0:18:32And I loved that about her.
0:18:32 > 0:18:36# My name up in lights, what an intellectual man.
0:18:36 > 0:18:41# I'll be.
0:18:41 > 0:18:42It will endure forever.
0:18:42 > 0:18:43Absolutely.
0:18:43 > 0:18:45I can't imagine it not.
0:18:45 > 0:18:48Yours faithfully, Adrian Albert Mole.
0:18:48 > 0:18:49It's a classic, isn't it?
0:18:49 > 0:18:50It a modern classic.
0:18:50 > 0:18:56I think that's the way people see it.
0:18:56 > 0:18:58What is the book you'd recommend?
0:18:58 > 0:19:01Share your suggestion using the hashtag #LoveToRead
0:19:01 > 0:19:03and see what other books people have been talking about.
0:19:08 > 0:19:10Set here in North Nottinghamshire, our final book, Sons And Lovers,
0:19:10 > 0:19:14takes us back 100 years but it's still as fresh and vibrant
0:19:14 > 0:19:16and relevant today.
0:19:16 > 0:19:17It's a true literary classic.
0:19:17 > 0:19:21Sons And Lovers was written by DH Lawrence, the son of a miner born
0:19:21 > 0:19:25in a back-to-back terrace house just over there in Eastwood.
0:19:25 > 0:19:28Said to be his most autobiographical work, it describes life in the pits,
0:19:28 > 0:19:31a mother's love for her son and a quest to rise
0:19:31 > 0:19:36above working-class roots.
0:19:36 > 0:19:40"On Sunday mornings, he would get up and prepare breakfast.
0:19:40 > 0:19:43The fire was never let to go out.
0:19:43 > 0:19:47He toasted his bacon on a fork, and caught the drops of fat
0:19:47 > 0:19:48on his bread.
0:19:48 > 0:19:52Then he put the rasher on a thick slice of bread and cut off
0:19:52 > 0:19:55chunks with a clasp knife, poured tea into his
0:19:55 > 0:20:02saucer and was happy."
0:20:02 > 0:20:04Sons and Lovers is that rare thing.
0:20:04 > 0:20:07It's a working-class novel written by somebody
0:20:07 > 0:20:09who grew up working class.
0:20:09 > 0:20:11It's full of authentic detail about the way
0:20:11 > 0:20:13of life in this community.
0:20:13 > 0:20:17It reproduces speech patterns, habits and routines of life,
0:20:17 > 0:20:22so it's very authentic in that sense.
0:20:22 > 0:20:25There were seven in the Lawrence family and David Herbert Lawrence
0:20:25 > 0:20:27was born in the back streets of Eastwood in a miner's
0:20:27 > 0:20:32cottage, now a museum.
0:20:35 > 0:20:38The kitchen is a very kind of small place.
0:20:38 > 0:20:41It's a place where the family gathered, because it was the warmest
0:20:41 > 0:20:44place in the house, it always had the fire going.
0:20:44 > 0:20:46And often there's a feeling of claustrophobia in the way that
0:20:46 > 0:20:48Lawrence uses the kitchen.
0:20:48 > 0:20:50A lot of the things that happen in Sons And Lovers happen
0:20:50 > 0:20:52in the kitchen.
0:20:52 > 0:20:53Particularly the arguments in the kitchen,
0:20:53 > 0:20:56the blazing rows.
0:20:58 > 0:21:01A fine mess.
0:21:01 > 0:21:04Dos't think I'm goin' to sit wi' my arms danglin',
0:21:04 > 0:21:06cos tha's got a parson for tea wi' thee?
0:21:06 > 0:21:09SHOUTING.
0:21:09 > 0:21:14Whinnying!
0:21:17 > 0:21:20Just like in Sons And Lovers, the Lawrence home was cramped,
0:21:20 > 0:21:24noisy and lacked privacy.
0:21:24 > 0:21:27We think that they shared those facilities with three
0:21:27 > 0:21:31or four families who lived along the same row.
0:21:31 > 0:21:33There's no garden.
0:21:33 > 0:21:37It is just a shared yard which was probably beaten earth
0:21:37 > 0:21:39and there'd be children out there playing, it
0:21:39 > 0:21:43would be smelly, dirty, very busy, no privacy whatsoever.
0:21:43 > 0:21:51But the deprivations at home where nothing compared
0:21:51 > 0:21:53-- But the deprivations at home were nothing compared
0:21:53 > 0:21:55to the brutal life underground.
0:21:58 > 0:22:01Sons And Lovers was published in 1913 and for the first time,
0:22:01 > 0:22:03middle-class readers discovered just how hard and back-breaking
0:22:03 > 0:22:07the life of the miner was.
0:22:14 > 0:22:18Mining and pit life is the framework of the whole novel because it
0:22:18 > 0:22:22depicts that industrial, close-knit community.
0:22:22 > 0:22:25Very hard living and that, you don't know where the next
0:22:25 > 0:22:29penny is coming from.
0:22:29 > 0:22:32Just like in the novel, Lawrence's father was a butty,
0:22:32 > 0:22:36a sort of self-employed foreman.
0:22:36 > 0:22:42I mean to have it out.
0:22:42 > 0:22:45Catch me up.
0:22:45 > 0:22:47What he does, he's a middleman between the coal
0:22:47 > 0:22:49company and the men.
0:22:49 > 0:22:52He actually employs teams of colliers to get the coal
0:22:52 > 0:22:57out and he takes a cut.
0:22:59 > 0:23:01What I've always loved about the novel is just how
0:23:01 > 0:23:05graphically realistic, how intimate the portrayals
0:23:05 > 0:23:08of working-class life, the mining community are in it.
0:23:08 > 0:23:14That's the thing that strikes anybody who reads the novel.
0:23:14 > 0:23:17It commemorates working-class life and it presents working class life
0:23:17 > 0:23:21for a middle-class readership.
0:23:21 > 0:23:23"The sun was going down.
0:23:23 > 0:23:27Every open evening, the hills of Derbyshire were blazed
0:23:27 > 0:23:31over with red sunset.
0:23:31 > 0:23:35Mrs Morrell watched the sun sink from the glistening sky, leaving
0:23:35 > 0:23:38a soft, flower blue overhead.
0:23:38 > 0:23:44While the western space went red, several of the fire
0:23:44 > 0:23:47had swung down there."
0:23:47 > 0:23:50There's a real feeling, not only for the gritty reality
0:23:50 > 0:23:52of working life but also of the beautiful surrounding
0:23:52 > 0:23:55countryside around here.
0:23:55 > 0:23:58Of the way that the agricultural world was so close to the industrial
0:23:58 > 0:24:02world, of how one could escape from this world
0:24:02 > 0:24:06into another world beyond.
0:24:06 > 0:24:08The Lawrence family escaped by moving up the housing
0:24:08 > 0:24:11ladder within Eastwood, something else reflected
0:24:11 > 0:24:17in Sons And Lovers, with homes like this.
0:24:17 > 0:24:20It's called The Bottoms in the opening to Sons and lovers.
0:24:20 > 0:24:24It's an end terrace with a plot of garden to the side of it and it's
0:24:24 > 0:24:27a sign that the Lawrence family was moving up in the world.
0:24:31 > 0:24:36Lawrence of course would eventually leave Eastwood for good.
0:24:36 > 0:24:46He travelled and lived all over the world and died in France.
0:24:46 > 0:24:49For quite a whil, Eastwood resented the way their town had been depicted
0:24:49 > 0:24:51in Sons And Lovers and Lawrence retaliated by saying
0:24:51 > 0:24:52he hated the damn place.
0:24:52 > 0:24:54But these days Eastwood relishes and even raises
0:24:54 > 0:24:59a glass to DH Lawrence.
0:24:59 > 0:25:01Yes, here you can get yourself a pint of Mellors named
0:25:01 > 0:25:04after the lusty gamekeeper in Lady Chatterley's Lover.
0:25:04 > 0:25:06But I'm not just here for a drink.
0:25:06 > 0:25:09I'm also here to learn about the language of Lawrence.
0:25:09 > 0:25:11Round here you'll hear lots of words from Lawrence's work.
0:25:11 > 0:25:16But what about the more obscure phrases, like scraightin?
0:25:16 > 0:25:20Did you know that meant to weep uncontrollably or slive, to creep up
0:25:20 > 0:25:25behind someone stealthily, or perhaps my favourite, clat-fart.
0:25:25 > 0:25:26Not what you think.
0:25:26 > 0:25:30In fact, it just means gossip.
0:25:30 > 0:25:40THEY READ FROM LAWRENCE.
0:25:42 > 0:25:44Drama students at the town's Hall Park Academy have been
0:25:44 > 0:25:46discovering their own personal connections with the
0:25:46 > 0:25:52language of Lawrence.
0:25:52 > 0:25:55Were there any specific words that you relate to, that you actually say
0:25:55 > 0:25:58and you actually use in your own everyday language?
0:25:58 > 0:25:59Owt.
0:25:59 > 0:26:01What do you use owt for?
0:26:01 > 0:26:02What does it mean?
0:26:02 > 0:26:06Instead of anything.
0:26:06 > 0:26:13If somebody offers you food, you'd say, I don't want owt.
0:26:13 > 0:26:15Yes, brilliant and we say that all the time.
0:26:15 > 0:26:18The language is so rich, it's very much how they speak now,
0:26:18 > 0:26:20even if the students won't admit that.
0:26:20 > 0:26:22They'll say, oh, no, I don't really understand,
0:26:22 > 0:26:25don't really talk like that, but once they start actually reading
0:26:25 > 0:26:27it and looking deeper into it, they realise that that is actually
0:26:27 > 0:26:30how they speak, they use a lot of the language,
0:26:30 > 0:26:39they use a lot of the words.
0:26:39 > 0:26:46You have to pick up all the old phrases and it's very hard.
0:26:46 > 0:26:48My mum grew up in Eastwood so she shortens words
0:26:48 > 0:26:51a lot of the time.
0:26:51 > 0:26:53And these students share something else with Lawrence
0:26:53 > 0:26:56and Sons And Lovers - a burning desire to leave Eastwood.
0:26:56 > 0:26:59When I'm older I want to act, so I want to get somewhere
0:26:59 > 0:27:01where it's easier for me to pursue my dreams.
0:27:01 > 0:27:04There's not a lot here to do, so maybe we'll move away and explore
0:27:04 > 0:27:07the country or the world or go to university or
0:27:07 > 0:27:08something like that.
0:27:08 > 0:27:14I think Sons And Lovers recreates and reproduces a very
0:27:14 > 0:27:19intimate, glimpse of a world that is now lost to us.
0:27:23 > 0:27:25Now, this is the really tricky bit.
0:27:25 > 0:27:28I need to decide which of the three brilliant books that we've featured
0:27:28 > 0:27:30in the programme is my favourite.
0:27:30 > 0:27:31My head is spinning.
0:27:31 > 0:27:35Alice should pick Saturday Night And Sunday Morning because it
0:27:35 > 0:27:42encapsulates almost a moment in British history.
0:27:42 > 0:27:45I think Sons And Lovers should be picked because it's
0:27:45 > 0:27:46just a wonderful story.
0:27:46 > 0:27:49Alice should pick The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole because it
0:27:49 > 0:27:52essentially was a revolution.
0:27:52 > 0:27:55Plenty of advice there but in the end I have
0:27:55 > 0:27:58to make the decision, so what is it going to be?
0:27:58 > 0:27:59Saturday Night And Sunday Morning?
0:27:59 > 0:28:01Arthur Seaton, I think we've all met one.
0:28:01 > 0:28:02Sons And Lovers, perhaps.
0:28:02 > 0:28:04It is still taught in schools today.
0:28:04 > 0:28:05And let's not forget Adrian Mole.
0:28:05 > 0:28:07Reading that again I realised how much I'd missed
0:28:07 > 0:28:08the first time around.
0:28:08 > 0:28:11But I can only pick one.
0:28:16 > 0:28:18It's got to be Saturday Night And Sunday Morning.
0:28:18 > 0:28:22In Arthur Seaton, Alan Sillitoe has created a character that still feels
0:28:22 > 0:28:23completely relevant even today.
0:28:23 > 0:28:26He is fighting against authority he's pushing against older
0:28:26 > 0:28:30generations, he doesn't want to give up on that hedonistic
0:28:30 > 0:28:32lifestyle and in 2016, that is definitely something
0:28:32 > 0:28:33I recognise.
0:28:33 > 0:28:37So this is my favourite but what is yours?
0:28:37 > 0:28:47From me and Books That Made Britain, goodbye.