Pratt Of The Argus

Henry Pratt #2

by David Nobbs

Henry Pratt, back home from National Service, is a man at last. As eager to prove it as he is to please, he is in at the deep end in his chosen profession - cub reporter on the Thurmarsh Evening Argus.

As trams and typewriters chatter to the echoes of Suez and Hungary, Henry finds himself in an exciting if bewildering world. His first scoop about a stolen colander is not quite as straightforward as he hopes.

Misprints and chuckles abound as ever-hopeful Henry manages to fall foul both of typesetters and attractive women. And, in a profession not noted for kindness to the diffident, he is as prone to accident as practical jokes.

Nothing ever goes quite right for Henry. So when the scoop of a lifetime finally comes his way it threatens to upset the family and complicate further his ever-hopeful love life.

Genres: Fiction, Humor, British Literature

384 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1988

Reviews

[Simon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Along with Peter Tinniswood and Alan Plater, Nobbs is a brilliant chronicler of the north from a time when smoke filled the air, the clump of steam hammer provided a rhythm to life and canals and rivers teamed with murk and scum. Henry Pratt is a wonderful creation. He's a perfect Everyman to journey with through childhood and into early adulthood. (It's nearly thirty years since I read part one of this trilogy). He's gauche and naive enough to be farcically charming yet strong enough in his views and beliefs to hold his own when he needs to. We travel through the late fifties with our hero. Along the way Nobbs keeps us informed of developments in the desert where France, Britain and Israel prove their cack-handedness over Suez, rebels fight for independence in Cyprus and Russian tanks enter Budapest. In Thurmarsh (a fictionalised Sheffield) things are altogether more familiar. Local government corruption is taken almost as a perk of the councillor's job. Lovely buildings that had survived the Luftwaffe are demolished to make way for the soulless markets, shopping centres and high rise flats that were demolished a generation later.
There's a decent murder mystery running through the middle of this and Nobbs handles it with the skill of a crime writer, albeit one with comic intent. And we get to see inside the offices (and backrooms of public houses) where the day to day work of a provincial newspaper goes on. Like Tinniswood before him, Nobbs worked for the Sheffield Star in the fifties. He gives us a splendid cast of hacks, critics subs, editors and sports journos. I'm sure it can't have been quite like that, but there must be more than an outline of truth. The regional paper is fast becoming a thing of the past. I've lived my life and measured it out through the pages of the Barrow Evening News, the Huddersfield Examiner, The Stoke on Trent Sentinel, The Exeter Express and Echo and the Sheffield Star. Pratt of the Argus provides a fitting requiem to their eventual departure. Unfortunately, despite his great success as a scriptwriter for a generation of comics and for his immortal Reginald Perrin, Nobbs, like provincial newspapers, isn't read as much as he should be these days. Second From Last in the Sack Race (Volume one of the trilogy) recently featured on Radio 4s A Good Read. Maybe this will mark a revival of interest. I hope so. David Nobbs deserves to be read and The Complete Pratt should be better known.

[Cadiva · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started my 20 year journalism career the year this was published, I was 18 years old and Henry Pratt's activities on the Thurmarsh Evening Argus could have been culled from my first few years in the job on a weekly broadsheet in a small Yorkshire market town.

Still one of the funniest, and accurate for all its comedy, portrayals of life back in the days of "cub" reporters sent out into the world alone to fend for themselves.

By the end of my first week I'd seen a dead body (laid out in the coffin on a table in the dining room as I went to do an obituary!) interviewed my first angry teenagers (who wanted a skate park), covered my first town council meeting (lots of hot air and nothing much else) and spent the day in the Magistrates' Court listening to people try to get off speeding charges and avoid getting sent to youth detention for fighting.

I loved every bit of it.

[Rosemary]

I enjoyed the first in this series, about Henry Pratt's childhood, but I thought this one was dreadful. One sexist cliché after another.

[Edward Champion · Rating 3 out of 5]

Nobbs's second Pratt novel is a hairline better than the first one -- in large part because Nobbs seems to be on firmer ground with farcical adult situations than in getting in touch with what it means to grow up as a kid. But it still falls short of the charm and the precision of the Reginald Perrin novels. And with its expose of journalism, it stands in the imposing shadow of Evelyn Waugh's SCOOP, though Nobbs falls far short of Waugh's talent. It doesn't help that Nobbs tends to pursue comedic ideas, only to drop them, such as the mysterious misprints in Henry Pratt's column. There is admittedly some fun with the many women Pratt is involved with, but this is belied by a dated misogyny that streaks through this book in its physical description of women. This is the fifth Nobbs novel I've read and I'm really starting to understand how limited he is and why he has fallen out of fashion. If there had been some of the electric vivacity you see in an Iris Murdoch novel, this book might have worked better.

[Carolyn]

Genius

[Bookthesp1 · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a masterclass in comic novel writing and a great example of the enormous talent that David Nobbs possessed. Also fascinating in that the novel is set in the 1950s and resembles some efforts by contemporary writers despite being written in the 1980s - also part of a series of four books though the only one I’ve read so far - shades of Perrin with a large number of appropriate character names - in this case “ Northern” - so Braithwaite; Skipton; Mallet; Marsden and cousins such as Hilda and Doris… Henry Pratt is pursuing a late coming of age as a cub reporter on a local paper; the story covers his pursuit of women; his progress at work covering dull provincial stories and his investigations into local property deal shenanigans …. Nobbs anticipates the David Kynaston school of post war history as he begins chapters with random lists of mid fifties world events ( the sort Henry might eventually aspire to cover ) as well as more trivial or eclectic happenings. The novel is brilliant at establishing time ( 1956/57) and place - beautifully written with set piece scenes; clever arch dialogue in the press room or pubs and a great number of laughs - Henry Pratt has to grow up and have his wits about him whilst dealing with predatory colleagues like the flirty Helen Cornish or his demanding editor.
A fine comic novel which will inevitably lead me to the other volumes in the series! Recommended!!

[Timothy · Rating 3 out of 5]

First third of the book captivates with the main character beginning a career as a journalist on a local newspaper, hinting at career success story. Deteriorates into a soap apera of office politics. Bizarre surprise ending seems contrived out of author's desperation to tie up loose ends and finish the story. High marks for humor. Points lost for tedium. Not sure if I'd read anything else by this author.

[Toby Muse · Rating 3 out of 5]

It’s funny, a novel from a time when books like these competed with sitcoms - light, comical, not too deep. The jokes are good, especially the one where he misses the context of the interviewee’s comments and prints the wrong thing. It’s a good ending - given the scoop of a lifetime but unwilling to use it and so realizing that journalism is not for him.

[Tony · Rating 3 out of 5]

The continuing story of the life of the often hapless Henry Pratt, this time focusing on his early career as a journalist. Nobbs again populates the story with quirky characters and a convoluted plot that ultimately does not give Henry the scoop that he really wants, although he does get the girl (and quits as a journalist).

[Susan]

Henry Pratt works on a newspaper

[David Short · Rating 4 out of 5]

Funny book recounting the early career of a journalist

[John Jarman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Laughs and Lumps

Beautifully crafted piece of work. Nobbs plays with the language with wit and whimsy and gives you laughs while swallowing the lump in your throat.

[Ann · Rating 2 out of 5]

I suppose it would have been a good read if he hadn't been so awful at age 22.