Craig Taylor (2) (1976–)

I've enjoyed a lot of it and the rest should be read with that in mind. I can imagine a better oral history type thing but it'd be hard to do and I think a lot of my problems are general problems I'd have with anything of this type. Some of the stories are genuinely affecting and are the sort of thing you could make a novel of - just surviving, the problems they've been through. There are a few people talked to who you'd never think of just walking around London. Even some of the people who show more came across as total turds were interesting, just for revealing how some people think and common views of Londoners, Englishness etc. If you think the idea of a collection of personal stories from a wide range of Londoners sounds interesting, get it.

However, there are some issues which run through it that mean I keep putting it down, being frustrated, wishing I wasn't reading about these particular people. A lot of these stories feature people talking about and for other people. There's a lot of casual bigotry going on. So many people buy into these myths that if people REALLY want to live OK, they can. So much is from the perspective of people not worrying about how to keep going. You just wish for more "alternative" voices, people who have trouble living in London, people who are against certain mainstream positions. There definitely are quite a lot but the sort of fake-interesting people dominate. Sometimes I couldn't believe people actually approved the stuff they said. Some people are just giant arseholes, which I guess is important to get an accurate picture. Some examples

- Teacher calling her class "crazies" and being upset that she's been attached to the lowest set, complaining about other teachers being lazy
- A "commentator" who said that it was right for Wonderbra adverts to go up outside a mosque and pathetic for "Islamists" to object because it's a liberal democracy where difference is respected who then goes on to complain about people speaking different languages, clustering in communities around the country their families came from, etc. The only difference allowed is within a very narrow scope, apparently.
- Club bouncer who says they often reject Eastern Europeans because "through experience" they've found they're generally bad.
- Commuter who rightly complains about the incredibly dirty trains but also complains about everyone else who gets the train with her, including children etc with apparently no compassion.
- The prologue to the book was someone now living in South Africa who described London as a city for people with Asperger's syndrome. It's kind of a personal subject for me but it was mostly just pathetic and laughable and it's kind of embarrassing that anyone thought that was appropriate for the first thing people read, no less.

There's no views from people in these "Islamist" communities, obviously no right of reply or anything, it just feels like these statements expose big gaps in coverage and the judgement passed without comment are frustrating, I honestly don't blame Taylor much for this - I think it's difficult to get the balance right and find people who actually want to talk in detail about more difficult stuff. I imagine there's also a feeling of wanting to make an "interesting" book which has more dramatic/unusual stories so some stuff which is important but normal falls by the wayside. Sometimes I wish he'd step in and give more of his opinion - although the few asides he does write are often snarky and I didn't appreciate that. My annoyance here is also definitely partially down to my political views - obviously it's frustrating to read people saying things that you don't just disagree with but you know to be wrong but there was also stuff which was understandable that I disagreed with. Some of the people just really rubbed me the wrong way but I can't put my finger on it - maybe a sort of condescending attitude from them or something.

What I mean by fake-interesting are these people who are blaggarts, who've done things but anyone could have done them given their starting situation, that sort of thing. There's someone called Smartie who's some sort of stockbroker turned DJ and he's absolutely obnoxious and constantly goes on about himself but for some reason he's given 3 sections, which is annoying. Some of the things which are interesting but not that sort of interesting are given short-shrift - for example someone who looks after bees only gets 3 pages, we don't see a wide section of jobs which are essential to London (no bus or tube drivers).

I find it interesting that so many people thought the book was too negative because it never came across that way to me at all. There were negative bits and positive bits, various bits were romanticised, but there was at least an attempt to give a variety of views and not succumb to a "good old London what a great place" thing even if it didn't always succeed. There is obviously a lot of romanticism but I think it just happens when people are talking in this context - it's hard to avoid and he didn't indulge it too much. I appreciated that a lot. I felt that even when people had a lot of trouble with London, the voices chosen often appreciated London as a whole. It's not complete positivity but as a whole it's optimistic.

It strikes me how even those who moan about "community" hardly ever mention even talking to other people. There's a strong undercurrent of isolation running through the stories, even though it's only rarely made explicit. To study the stories as a kind of snapshot of current culture, of how we interact with each other, would be interesting. I had a lot of thoughts about this stuff. There's a lot of side comments on things like gentrification.

Ultimately though I enjoyed it a lot and even the people I thought were awful were mostly interesting. The stuff above is a bit exaggerated probably, it's just a shame that a few bolshy people made the book less enjoyable than it should be. The theming is perfect and it makes the ending bittersweet in a great way. It feels like a good summary of London. show less

Overall, an interesting and perceptive anthology of various Londoners' views of their city. Most of the oral histories give at least some insights into the nature of living and working in London, which comes off as a busy, vibrant multicultural metropolis that still attracts people from around the country. There were a few stories I didn't like, as they were overwhelming critical, in a very overgeneralized way -- and, because of that, they said much more about the speakers than about where show more they lived. (It's an odd choice on Taylor's part to open his book with one such negative piece.) Still worth the read for those interested in London, if not up to Studs Terkel's best. show less

Wow. I laughed, I cried, I empathised. Every thought and feeling I've ever had about London, give or take, is expressed by someone in this book. I don't know if people who don't have a very strong connection with London would get it but I want this book forever.

Over a period of six years, the author, Craig Taylor, met with, interviewed and be-friended scores of New York residents from all walks of life - each of them eager to share their slice of New York City with us. The resulting book, “New Yorkers, A City and Its People in our Time”, is a fascinating literary mosaic of dozens of unique and intimate musings collected and distilled for us into one wonderful volume.

Some of the characters we meet include a security guard at the Statue of show more Liberty, a city roadworks engineer trying to hold back the tide on crumbling streets and Infrastructure, and a COVID patient admitted to a NY hospital in the height of the earliest pandemic days.

We meet some of the homeless, the poverty-stricken, a criminal, a lawyer, the militant, a cop, a 911 dispatcher and several social justice seekers; as well as nannies, tutors, interior designers and others trying to eke out a living at the hands of a city which has evolved into a “playground for the rich”, or as some see it, the “violently or aggressively wealthy”.

Several of the stories involve young people arriving from midwestern or southern states, - artists, actors, journalists, singers - creative hopefuls caught up in the dream, the “generosity of opportunities”, the theatrical loudness and the “great bigness” of everything NY.

Across it all, the voices we hear are alternately strident, empathetic, assertive, intelligent, kind, angry, reflective, uncompromising and many are fiercely proud of their borough and their city - in short, every and all characteristics you would expect to find in the population of any huge metropolitan area. What makes this collection cohesive then, is not what these individuals have in common, so much as what they don’t.

If it wasn’t clear beforehand, its certainly clear after losing yourself to this totally engrossing collection of characters - New York City, as evidenced in this book, pulsates with an inexhaustible, fluid, larger-than-life energy which feeds on diversity - the outcome evident in an ever-widening cacophony of city living, an “assault on the senses”, that, love it or hate it, is impossible for an individual to ignore.

A big thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for an advance review copy in exchange for my honest review. All thoughts presented are my own. show less