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The Diaries of Mr Lucas: Life in 1960s Gay London
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
May 1, 2026
I was expecting a far bigger foray into the gay side of Swinging London, but the book covers a surprisingly small range of facets: faith, first love and heartbreak, liaison with a gangster, press with the mob, a brief snippet of the political climate pre- and post-Profumo, and queer crackdowns by plainclothes bobbies. Domestic details of places long gone are delicious: where the diarist dined, what he (didn’t) cook, where he hung out, where he cruised, but these are too few and rather far between. Expect a curious peep rather than a full immersion.
The biggest downside: we don’t get enough of Mr Lucas’s actual entries and when we do, they are truncated. The majority of the text is occupied by the commentary of journalist Hugo Greenhalgh who was given access to the holy grail of his friend’s lifetime of diaries and Irish-boy fetish. Sometimes, entries are woven into the commentary without any date attached, so we have no clue whether they’re from 1948 or 1968.
If the contextual clarifications are necessary and digestible, some passages are all about the journalist (one example is a lengthy beat by beat description of his journey on a ferry, scarcely related to the topic.) I was left craving more of the actual source material. On a positive note, the journalist seems to take an unbiased view of his subject and doesn’t smooth over the pedantic civil servant’s more unpalatable traits, portraying him as both sleazeball and prude.
Warts and all, Mr. L is made flesh and bone and was, by all accounts, selfish, arrogant, predatory, right-wing, acerbic, jealous, needy, phlegmatic, sentimentally gullible, unhygienically slovenly and clearly classist. He is even described as smelling like actual “shit”. The entries we do get are splendidly written, rich with slang of the time, and spiked with Mr Lucas’s viper tongue and corrosive mid-century wit. A reminder that gay bitchiness is nothing new and we all inherit it to a certain extent.
An easy and entertaining read overall.
The biggest downside: we don’t get enough of Mr Lucas’s actual entries and when we do, they are truncated. The majority of the text is occupied by the commentary of journalist Hugo Greenhalgh who was given access to the holy grail of his friend’s lifetime of diaries and Irish-boy fetish. Sometimes, entries are woven into the commentary without any date attached, so we have no clue whether they’re from 1948 or 1968.
If the contextual clarifications are necessary and digestible, some passages are all about the journalist (one example is a lengthy beat by beat description of his journey on a ferry, scarcely related to the topic.) I was left craving more of the actual source material. On a positive note, the journalist seems to take an unbiased view of his subject and doesn’t smooth over the pedantic civil servant’s more unpalatable traits, portraying him as both sleazeball and prude.
Warts and all, Mr. L is made flesh and bone and was, by all accounts, selfish, arrogant, predatory, right-wing, acerbic, jealous, needy, phlegmatic, sentimentally gullible, unhygienically slovenly and clearly classist. He is even described as smelling like actual “shit”. The entries we do get are splendidly written, rich with slang of the time, and spiked with Mr Lucas’s viper tongue and corrosive mid-century wit. A reminder that gay bitchiness is nothing new and we all inherit it to a certain extent.
An easy and entertaining read overall.
July 5, 2025
An enthralling and engaging account of an extraordinary ordinary life. Sympathetically curated with incisive commentary. A treat.
August 9, 2025
A 4.5. Very evocative and a great social history of those times in both actions and attitudes.
March 29, 2026
What an interesting book - so interesting to learn about gay life in 60’s London. What a different time it was.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews