David Peace, Novelist

Picked up that £2 outsize GB84. The trouble with such cheapness, everywhere, is that it now has to take its place in a pile of about two hundred similar unread acquisitions

Timely revive - someone gave me The Damned United for Christmas, I was going to ask ILE about it. So it's good, then?

I'd love to have been able to read The Damned Utd from the persepctive of having no knowledge of football or who Brian Clough was, wonder how it would read

― Vicious Cop Kills Gentle Fool (Tom D.), Thursday, 8 January 2009 12:07 (29 minutes ago) Bookmark

I did this as much as is humanly possible and loved it. Bought it for my mum for Xmas and she loved it too.

I've only read GB84; it was brutally perfect. I have Tokyo Year Zero but haven't ever felt in the mood to begin it ...

I'd love to have been able to read The Damned Utd from the persepctive of having no knowledge of football or who Brian Clough was, wonder how it would read

... having only the vaguest and sketchiest knowledge of Brian Clough, and caring so little about football that I can't actually think of a suitably dismissive metaphor, I'm obviously an ideal case study! A pal did suggest to me that lack of football knowledge wouldn't matter at all; that said, it's a book that obviously doesn't have immediate appeal for me.

Anyway. Intrigued by the RR books being made into TV. Anyone read them?

Timely revive - someone gave me The Damned United for Christmas, I was going to ask ILE about it. So it's good, then?

― Matt DC, Thursday, 8 January 2009 12:52 (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Yeah, I'd suggest reading it followed by http://www.amazon.co.uk/Provided-You-Dont-Kiss-Me/dp/0007247109, kinda like when TV stations bookend a movie with a documentary about the issues discussed.

I had Brian Clough's voice (or rather David Peace's Brian Clough's voice) as my interior monologue for about 2 months after reading The Damned Utd. Might explain why I did so badly at those job interviews last summer.

After Clough & Scargill, who could he do next? Bernard Manning? Mark E Smith?

Compo

Damned Utd isn't exactly heavy on the intricacies of football tactics, it's just well-observed northern swearing transplanted into sport instead of the Yorkshire underworld. It's so psychologically believable that I found it a bit hard to not just assume it was all straight fact, down to the desk smashing incident. It was drawn from a ridiculously wide range of sources, mind

Recall Marcello saying that the RR books do tend to degenerate into Tales From The Crypt a bit in their last quarters; the end of the second one (77) is one of the most disturbing things I've ever read, but also very faintly ridiculous

After Clough & Scargill, who could he do next? Bernard Manning? Mark E Smith?

Lancashire bastids.

Obv. Sean Bean is next on the list.

http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2007/05_01/warnockDM1205_468x356.jpg

But seriously though, Geoffrey Boycott

Michael Parkinson. Who knows what goes on beneath that suave exterior?

In the morning I get out of bed.
Right out of the bed.
Not half out of bed.
Right out of bed.

I look at the bed and I try to get as far away from it as possible.

Boycott has potential, that 100th century scenario was pretty dramatic

Potential for a David Peace spoof, at any rate

Leeds United FC: Their Decline And Fall

WHAT I'VE LEARNED THIS WEEK

The learning.
The doing.
The week.
The football. Always the football.

He was learning. Teaching. Learning -

HOW TO MANAGE.

His Wiki entry says that he's planning a book about Geoffrey Boycott next.

good, Geoff's one of the most enduring and weirdly engaging characters in post-war British sport

To be entitled "The Corridor of Uncertainty", hopefully.

Ha ha, no way, you're joking?!??!?

No that was from my own brane.

No, I meant about him writing a book about Geoffrey Boycott!

I briefly considered writing a "The Damned Rovers" parody, detailing Roy Race's brief stay as a player at Melborough. Someone else can steal that idea if they have any joeks.

"The Damned Rangers", detailing Paul le Guen's tenure at Ibrox could certainly work

x-post I really hope it's true too that would be amazing.

btw speaking of things that are incredibly Yorkshire, check this

the actual Roy of the Rovers went a bit bleak and gritty on its unsuccessful relaunch

Louis, that is fucking top.

Also check out this one for a) a moment of hilarious racist commentary and b) a line about two female darts-players that makes Alan Partridge seem dignified

HAHA HAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAH HAHAHAH HAHAHAHAHAHAH AHAHHAH AHHAHAHA ... god. Yorkshire. The seventies. Yorkshire in the seventies. (NB: as a Lancashire twat, I'm certainly not saying Lancashire was any fucking better.)

Sometimes the 70s actually were like "the 70s"

That IS hilarious - new display name ahoy.

I was waiting for someone to do that. You win the SPECIAL PRIZE: a half-drunk pint of mild with a dollop of Fred Trueman's pipe-baccy-flavoured spit floating on top (NB: spit may not be authentic Trueman slobber; flavour may be B&H).

I'll see tha'

Thee

Actually what does he say at the beginning? "Now then"?

If so, that is how i am going to open all my conversations from now on.

Actually what does he say at the beginning? "Now then"?

That's Jimmy Saville, another possible subject for the pen of David Peace

Guy on Facebook sez Haines' memoir has Peace foreword where Peace claims to have listened to loads of Auteurs records to get himself in a murder-book-writin' frame of mind

always kind of assumed given Peace's stern i-hate-films-and-comedy stance that Haines' admiration/writing of bad songs about Leeds would of been unwelcome

GB84. Read it now. Oh, you can't - it's not out for another fortnight.

::hugs own proof copy like a miser::

― suzy (suzy), Friday, 27 February 2004 16:54 (4 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

this is the worst post ever btw

I'd love to have been able to read The Damned Utd from the persepctive of having no knowledge of football or who Brian Clough was, wonder how it would read

― Vicious Cop Kills Gentle Fool (Tom D.), Thursday, January 8, 2009 1:07 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

dyou reckon it would work? i have the vaguest idea of who clough was -- soundbitey football manager -- but this is basically me; would i like the book?

(fucking five years since i started this thread and still haven't turned page one of a peace book. fuck this phd imo.)

xpost

ye gods

love thread's first reply it is perfect well only when followed by the second

But such a great set up for the follow-ups.

Just ordered the Quartet on Amazon. Am gonna try to read 'em quickly, though "The Rest is Noise" is still on the go after six months so we'll see.

Enrique, I know about as much about football as you and I got along fine.

xp

my non-thesis reading is 'homicide: a year on the killing streets', to be followed by haines, as it goes, so it is a logical progression. the quartet does look tasty.

i'm waiting to see Homocide cheap enough somewhere to be an impulse buy. Same with the Haines really. Even though I can't stand the guy's music.

i bought n/homicide not long after starting this thread - cheaper but uglier object. it's very good.

‘A compelling read, part Oswald Spengler, part Spike Milligan, and very, very funny.‘ - David Peace

Peace channeling Alison Graham

Shankly's such a sainted individual and I'm not sure how interested I am in reading Peace's take on that.

Hmmmmmm, or Liverpool FC and Liverpool in general. Someone will undoubtedly get me it for my Christmas!

Jimmy Saville, another possible subject for the pen of David Peace

― Vicious Cop Kills Gentle Fool (Tom D.), Thursday, 8 January 2009 17:59 (4 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

...errrrrrrrrr

Actually I think that would be brilliant but it's way too soon and he'd be pilloried.

A sequel about Bob Paisley would be nice.

Let's just throw in Roy Evans and be done with it.

Still waiting on the Geoffrey Boycott one

I went to a d peace q&a and iirc he has done some early work on a Savile story but a completed novel is way, way off. He was really enthusiastic about a boycott book. The only thing he definitely doesn't want to do ever is Hillsborough.

yeah boycott i would read

holy shit red riding

the TV one I mean

everyone otm up thread about the flaws but still p superior stuff IMO despite not hearing any dialogue nor knowing why 1980 was even made tbh nor why nothing was explained and wait are we meant to be cheering for David Morrissey now cos fuck that

but still really enjoyed anyway.

David Morrissey is good.

oh yeah agreed but the character like

ah i can't remember who he was really. totally weird that i followed about 30% of this but still liked it.

just finished GB84 (it only hit US bookshops a few months ago a bit after red or dead's release here). arguably his hardest book to follow aside from nineteen eighty-three but completely worth it. I'd call it his bleakest book, but also arguably his best written.

I've now read all his books except the football ones, bc like GB84 they weren't available easily in the states till recently. are they worth a look? hearing v mixed stuff about red or dead, especially due to its style.

Adaptation(s) of red riding probably deserve more longstanding recognition

i didn't like them very much.

stoked for peace's plans on a novel about geoffrey boycott

red or dead is peace's masterwork for me. but you have to enjoy reading long passages of succinct football results

Hey.
I know I need a late-pass, but I'm 3/4 through the Red Riding novels and am enjoying them, if one can enjoy something so unremittingly bleak. the unanswered questions from book to book and the introduction of a new protagonist with each novel were pretty neat in that they were frustrating at first but I also find the unknown qualities and contexts pretty compelling too.

should i watch the films? opinions seem mixed with most upthread finding them a bit of a drag.

I thought they were brilliant

I've been watching the films, now. They are pretty good! Bordering on very good, but still borderline incomprehsible.

good to see he finally finished the tokyo trilogy. very good ending imo though will likely be incomprehensible to those who weren’t already fans of his style

Red Riding trilogy films are easily watched within the month of free BritBox subscription offer.

red riding movies are good though they definitely feel more like tv movies than movie movies (i know they were produced as tv movies but also shown cinematically). i actually like 1980 the best even though it's a deviation from the "main" plot because i like paddy considine more than the other leads and it has the most sean harris, ie the creepiest creep ever.

guess i should read some david peace

The Robert Sheehan character BJ is Peace’s shout to one of my closest friends, JB. He and Dave grew up together.

oh i might have read tokyo year zero