Till Time's Last Sand

by David Kynaston

  ‘He compresses the vivid fragments so that a subtle but irresistible narrative emerges from them: more mosaic, perhaps, than collage’ Andrew Marr, New Statesman

  ‘Triumphant … A historian of peerless sensitivity and curiosity about the lives of individuals’ Financial Times

  ‘Wise, funny, impeccably researched and beautifully written’ Craig Brown, Mail on Sunday

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  Modernity Britain: Opening the Box, 1957–1959

  The late 1950s was an action-packed, often dramatic time in which the contours of modern Britain began to take shape. These were the ‘never had it so good’ years, when the Carry On film series and the TV soap Emergency Ward 10 got going, and films like Room at the Top and plays like A Taste of Honey brought the working class to the centre of the national frame; when the urban skyline began irresistibly to go high-rise; when CND galvanised the progressive middle class; when ‘youth; emerged as a cultural force; when the Notting Hill riots made race and immigration an inescapable reality; and when ‘meritocracy’ became the buzz word of the day. The consequences of this ‘modernity’ zeitgeist, David Kynaston argues, still affect us today.

  ‘Volumes full of treasure, serious history with a human face’ Hilary Mantel, Observer, Summer Reads

  ‘It will surely come to be seen not just as one of the present era’s most important histories, but as one of the most illuminating works of literature’ Jonathan Coe, Prospect

  ‘Modernity Britain is both even-handed and exhilarating, a rare combination … When he expresses overt opinions, they are always thoughtful, and arrive like thunder-flashes, illuminating the pages around them ... Was ever a history book so authoritative and, at the same time, quite so entertaining?’ Craig Brown, Mail on Sunday

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  Family Britain, 1951–1957

  As in Austerity Britain, an astonishing array of vivid, intimate and unselfconscious voices drive the narrative. The keen-eyed Nella Last shops assiduously at Barrow Market as austerity and rationing gradually give way to relative abundance; housewife Judy Haines, relishing the detail of suburban life, brings up her children in Chingford; the self-absorbed civil servant Henry St John perfects the art of grumbling. These and many other voices give a rich, unsentimental picture of everyday life in the 1950s. We also encounter well-known figures on the way, such as Doris Lessing (joining and later leaving the Communist Party), John Arlott (sticking up on Any Questions? for the rights of homosexuals) and Tiger’s Roy of the Rovers (making his goal-scoring debut for Melchester).

  All this is part of a colourful, unfolding tapestry, in which the great national events – the Tories returning to power, the death of George VI, the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth, the Suez Crisis – jostle alongside everything that gave Britain in the 1950s its distinctive flavour: Butlin’s holiday camps, Kenwood food mixers, Hancock’s Half-Hour, Ekco television sets, Davy Crockett, skiffle and teddy boys. Deeply researched, David Kynaston’s Family Britain offers an unrivalled take on a largely cohesive, ordered, still very hierarchical society gratefully starting to move away from the painful hardships of the 1940s towards domestic ease and affluence.

  ‘This wonderful volume is only the first in a series that will take us to 1979 and the election of Margaret Thatcher. When complete, Kynaston’s skill in mixing eyewitness accounts and political analysis will surely be one of the greatest and most enduring publishing ventures for generations’ Brian Thompson, Observer

  ‘Even readers who can remember the years Kynaston writes about will find they are continually surprised by the richness and diversity of his material ... mouth-watering’ John Carey, Sunday Times

  ‘The book is a marvel ... the level of detail is precise and fascinating’ John Campbell, Sunday Telegraph

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  Austerity Britain, 1945–1951

  A Sunday Times bestseller

  Coursing through Austerity Britain is an astonishing variety of voices – vivid, unselfconscious, and unaware of what the future holds. A Chingford housewife endures the tribulations of rationing; a retired schoolteacher observes during a royal visit how well-fed the Queen looks; a pernickety civil servant in Bristol is oblivious to anyone’s troubles but his own. An array of working-class witnesses describe how life in post-war Britain is, with little regard for liberal niceties or the feelings of their ‘betters’.

  Many of these voices will stay with the reader in future volumes, jostling alongside well-known figures like John Arlott (here making his first radio broadcast, still in police uniform), Glenda Jackson (taking the 11+) and Doris Lessing, newly arrived from Africa, struck by the levelling poverty of postwar Britain. David Kynaston weaves a sophisticated narrative of how the victorious 1945 Labour government shaped the political, economic and social landscape for the next three decades. Deeply researched, often amusing and always intensely entertaining and readable, the first volume of David Kynaston’s ambitious history offers an entirely fresh perspective on Britain during those six momentous years.

  ‘This is a classic; buy at least three copies – one for yourself and two to give to friends and family’ Guardian

  ‘The book is a marvel ... the fullest, deepest and most balanced history of our times’ Sunday Telegraph

  ‘A wonderfully illuminating picture of the way we were’ The Times

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  https://www.bloomsbury.com/author/david-kynaston/

  First published in Great Britain 2017

  This electronic edition published in 2017 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

  © David Kynaston 2017

  David Kynaston has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Author of this work.

  Every reasonable effort has been made to trace copyright holders of material reproduced in this book, but if any have been inadvertently overlooked the publishers would be glad to hear from them. For legal purposes the Acknowledgements constitute an extension of this copyright page.

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  All rights reserved. You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages

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  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  ISBN 978 1 4088 6857 7

  eISBN 978 1 4088 6858 4

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