The Co-Op's Got Bananas: A Memoir of Growing Up in the Post-War North

by Hunter Davies

A poignant and very personal childhood memoir of growing up in Cumbria during the Second World War and into the 1950s, from columnist Hunter Davies

Despite the struggle to make ends meet during the tough years of warfare in the 1940s and rationing persisting until the early 1950s, life could still be sweet. Especially if you were a young boy, playing football with your pals, saving up to go to the movies at the weekend, and being captivated by the latest escapade of Dick Barton on the radio.

Chocolate might be scarce, and bananas would be a pipe dream , but you could still have fun. In an excellent social memoir from one of the UK's premier columnists over the past five decades, Hunter Davies captures this period beautifully . His memoir of growing up in post-war North of England from 1945 onwards, amid the immense damage wrought by the Second World War , and the dreariness of life on rationing, very little luxuries and an archaic educational system, should be one that will resonate with thousands of readers across Britain.

In the same vein as Robert Douglas's Night Song of the Last Tram and Alan Johnson's  This Boy , Hunter's memories of a hard life laced with glorious moments of colour and emotion will certainly strike a vein with his generation.

Genres: Memoir, Nonfiction, Biography, History, British Literature, Biography Memoir

327 pages, Kindle Edition

First published April 7, 2016

About the author

Edward Hunter Davies OBE is an author, journalist and broadcaster, and a former editor for the Sunday Times of London. He is the author of numerous books, including The Glory Game and the only authorised biography of the Beatles. He was born in Johnstone, Renfrewshire, to Scottish parents. For four years his family lived in Dumfries until Davies was aged 11.

His family moved to Carlisle in northern England when Davies was 11 and he attended the Creighton School in the city. Davies lived in Carlisle until he moved to study at university. During this time his father, who was a former Royal Air Force pay clerk, developed multiple sclerosis and had to retire on medical grounds from a civil service career.

Davies joined the sixth form at Carlisle Grammar School and was awarded a place at University College, Durham to read for an honours degree in History, but after his first year he switched to a general arts course. He gained his first writing experience as a student, contributing to the university newspaper, Palatinate, where one of his fellow student journalists was the future fashion writer Colin McDowell. After completing his degree course he stayed on at Durham for another year to gain a teaching diploma and avoid National Service.

He lives in London.

Reviews

[Chrissie · Rating 3 out of 5]

The British author and journalist Hunter Davies is here, at the age of eighty, looking back at his youth. The book ends in 1960 when he, at the age of twenty-four, marries Margaret Forster. Both became authors. Both came from working class families. Both got themselves educated with scholarships -- he at University College Durham, she at the University of Oxford. His parents’ first child, he was born in Johnstone, Scotland, not far from Glasgow. The year was 1936. Both of his parents were of Scottish heritage, and he sees himself as a Scott too. He grew up in the provincial towns Dumfries, Scotland, and Carlisle, right over the border in England. Margaret, two years younger, was born and grew up in Carlisle. In 2016, she died, and I wonder if this doesn’t at least partially explain why the author has now written / published this book.

Hunter is the author of the only authorized biography of the Beatles: The Beatles. She, Margaret Forster, is the author of the 1965 novel Georgy Girl. Tell me, who doesn‘t remember both the film and the Seekers’s hit song Georgy Girl. These are the two we are reading about. OK, mostly about him but there is quite a bit about her too and you do get a feeling for what they shared, how they differed and their respective personalities.

We follow Hunter’s school years at Creighton School and Carlisle Grammar School. His interest in football, his yearning for a green Raleigh bike and what it took to get it. Home life was difficult. His father had multiple sclerosis and was bedridden. Providing for four children was no easy task for his mother.

We follow his studies and escapades at Durham. He worked as the editor for the school newspaper, Palatinate, good preparation for the career in journalism that followed.

The book is written with humor. Subtle, tongue-in-cheek humor is found in many, many of the lines. Pay attention, if you don’t you will easily miss what is actually being said. The tone is often self-deprecating. The two work well together. Amusing, humble and not showy. The part I like least is when he speaks of his time working in London, where he came to have contact with celebrities, but this is short. The better sections are his growth into adulthood, his growing understanding of himself and why and how he came to be married to Margaret. She insisted for years she did not want to marry and she did not want to have kids, but she did get herself a diaphragm, quite unusual for an unmarried woman of those times.

The book offers both humor and, in a more serious tone, speaks with honesty about his relationship with those of his family, of how he saw his mother and father as a child, as an adolescent and now as an elderly man. There is a balance of good and bad. His age has given him wisdom. What he is unsure of he puts before us as questions to consider. How do you relate to your parents when, as he has done, you have left their world behind? Was he at times ashamed of them?

The book looks at what it was like to grow up in provincial northern Britain during and after the war. The book is not focused upon politics, but decisions made by the government in place certainly influenced everyday life. Rationing, blackout regulations, subsidies to the poor, housing, medical and educational reforms, all made an impact on his life and the lives of ordinary people.

The audiobook is very well narrated by Cameron Stewart. Easy to follow, read at a good speed and not overdramatized. As I said, you have to listen to catch the underlying meaning and humor in the author’s words; none of this is smashed into your face.

I have no complaints with the book. I suppose I didn’t give it more stars quite simply because Hunter’s life is not all that exceptional. I do think a person growing up after the war, in the 1950s and 1960s, will enjoy this and easily relate to what is said.

[Nigeyb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Having thoroughly enjoyed A Life in the Day, the second part of Hunter Davies's autobiography back in 2018, I was keen to read its predecessor The Co-op's Got Bananas: A Memoir of Growing Up in the Post-War North

I love autobiographies and Hunter Davies is a wonderful writer however this one felt far too detailed, and that detail is often quite mundane. Some aspects of growing up in the 1940s and 1950s were fascinating, a lot of it just seemed to labour the points.

Perhaps I just wasn't in the mood however I have to confess that around the halfway stage I started to skip sections and was quite relieved when I'd finished.

3/5


Here's the blurb....

Despite the struggle to make ends meet during the tough years of warfare in the 1940s and rationing persisting until the early 1950s, life could still be sweet. Especially if you were a young boy, playing football with your pals, saving up to go to the movies at the weekend, and being captivated by the latest escapade of Dick Barton on the radio. Chocolate might be scarce, and bananas would be a pipe dream, but you could still have fun. In an excellent social memoir from one of the UK's premier columnists over the past five decades, Hunter Davies captures this period beautifully. His memoir of growing up in post-war North of England from 1945 onwards, amid the immense damage wrought by the Second World War, and the dreariness of life on rationing, very little luxuries and an archaic educational system, should be one that will resonate with thousands of readers across Britain.

In the same vein as Robert Douglas's Night Song of the Last Tram - A Glasgow Childhood, Hunter's memories of a hard life laced with glorious moments of colour and emotion will certainly strike a vein with his generation.

[Kelly Furniss · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very entertaining, enjoyable and humorous memoir of Hunter Davies growing up after WW2 in the North of England.

[Voirrey · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really enjoyed Hunter Davies memories of his childhood, teens and early twenties. He was starting university months before I was born, and so he is 'not quite a contemporary', so part of the enjoyment was in sing what was similar in his early life and what was so very different.

I also noticed a passing reference to someone who is well known, to me, as a local personality; I feel as if I should write to Hunter Davies saying 'Do you want to know what happened to TC?'!

[Esther Turnbull · Rating 3 out of 5]

Started off really good and kept me interested. Then I thought it got less interesting and I found myself skipping chunks and only reading the parts that interested me.

[Mairi Deans · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very entertaining

[Elite Group · Rating 4 out of 5]

An Account of Childhood Around World War II

Hunter Davies is an eminent writer, journalist and broadcaster whose most well-known publication is probably the only authorised biography of The Beatles.

The Co-Op’s Got Bananas is an account of Hunter Davies’ life until around the time of his marriage to Margaret, who incidentally died of cancer in February of this year.

It is impossible for me to say whether I liked this book because there were many parallels with my own early life or because it was a well written, finely observed history of those times. Probably a bit of both. The 50s in particular are often portrayed as being a time of rationing and deprivation but the author makes it abundantly clear that as a child those things didn’t matter as children had freedom to roam and time to do so in the absence of social media and television. It is only with hindsight that Hunter Davies realises that his mother worked tirelessly to bring up four young children, particularly as his father was bedridden with MS.

It is not a book with deep meanings but it does accurately reflect the times and in particular gives a wonderful insight into the way the press works and how newspapers at that time were printed. It is also a book about class and the social system of the time which hasn’t yet quite disappeared. Although there are a few confessions along the way I never felt that I really got to know the author’s innermost thoughts but maybe I had no right to do so but I somehow resented that and was expecting a little more than I was presented with. I also felt that the random mention on three or four occasions of Paul McCartney and John Lennon was totally out of place; didn’t add anything and was tantamount to name dropping.

I believe that anyone reading the book will get something from it although I feel that those of more advanced years may get more from it than others. After all it is a stroll down memory lane and what a stroll that can be.

mr zorg

Breakaway Reviewers received a copy of the book to review.

[Colin Lawrence · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hunter Davies never disappoints, whether it's when he's writing his entertaining and self-deprecating articles in The Sunday Times or in this case a partial autobiography of his life from his childhood in the North West through his marriage to the late Margaret Forster in 1960. I'm about ten years younger than Mr Davies, but his recollections of growing up in Post-war Britain in the 1940s and 50s rang a lot of bells with me. It's surprising how much one forgets about the austere conditions that prevailed during that period. Hunter Davies brings those memories vividly to life in all their glory and in many cases ignominy. He draws incredibly detailed pictures of all manner of things from the education system to the very social fabric of the country during the years following the Second World War through to the beginning of what people have dubbed the Swinging Sixties. He points out, quite correctly that those who say that if you remember the Sixties you weren't there, assuming that everyone was stoned out of their minds, when nothing could be further from the truth. This is no cosy walk down memory lane, it's much more than that. I found it thoroughly
engrossing and entertaining and, even if you're not as old as Mr Hunter (or me) read this book - you won't regret it.

[Sadie · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF @ 60%. I feel misled by the cover and blurb -- I thought this would be about the author's childhood, but that's less than half of the book. I just... wasn't interested in hearing about his time at university, or his first job. He talks about meeting his future wife and how she was Not Like Other Girls™ because she wore trousers and cut her hair short, instead of wearing high heels and makeup and styling her hair into a bouffant beehive like ~all the other girls~ did. At which point I rolled my eyes so hard they fell out of my head.

Also, the writing style was incredibly dull, or maybe it was just his life -- nothing ever seemed to happen to him, it was just a litany of "this happened, then I did this."

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have always been wary of Hunter Davies, since he wrote that adulatory book about Tottenham Hotspur, about whom I am, tribally, uninterested. The bits I most enjoyed about this memoir were the “ah yes, I remember it well sections, rationing, playing in the streets, and the ABC Minors, which triggered off reminiscences of my own childhood, which like Davies I enjoyed, despite the privations both general and personal. I was a bit bored by the university section, not having been; my interest Wes perked again by his early reporting memories, but his courtship Of Margaret Forster was of little interest. Not really my sort of book, but spasmodically entertaining.

[Penny · Rating 4 out of 5]

'Back when I were a nipper oop North' memoirs are ten a penny, but I knew Hunter Davies wouldn't let me down.

Davies has an easy, almost conversational style of writing. He's now 80 years old but fortunately he's not turned curmudgeonly (unlike the now grumpy and increasingly foul mouthed Bill Bryson in his last book).

The book is a look back at the life of Davies up until his marriage to Margaret Forster when he was 24. It's a great depiction of growing up in post war NE England, told with humour and honesty. Really enjoyed it.

[Dee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hunter Davies is the widower of one of my favourite authors, Margaret Forster, who sadly died last year. Having pieced together her life from her various non-fiction works, I was curious to see what the 'other half' would tell me, and it was a very pleasurable read. Although he's ten years older than me, there are many things we have in common in our background and upbringing, and it was like a trip down memory lane. Very readable!

[Cath Cole · Rating 5 out of 5]

An entertaining and informative account of a working class boy growing up in the north of England. The narrative is all the more poignant given the recent death of Margaret Forster, the authors wife.

[Matt · Rating 3 out of 5]

This was a real case of "kinda interesting, but kinda boring".
How a man could have been brought into the world in such trying times, in such interesting times and portray his upbringing in such a mundane manner.
So underwhelming is his storytelling of his life that when such incidences as running to an underground shelter to his from falling Nazi bombs or when, as the title suggests, after years of hardships and rationing the co-op finally gets bananas that you feel nothing.
He doesn't describe his world sufficiently enough so that you can feel the enormity of the occasion of hiding from bombs, nor does he envelop you in the hardships to appreciate how special the arrival of bananas is.

I feel like I've been cheated out of a good story here. I don't know if this was ghost written, or if this 90-something guy penned this, but it's not what you'd expect from such a bestselling book about a life from that era.

2.5 stars - there are better books on the same subject out there.

[Helen Felgate · Rating 3 out of 5]

3-4 stars for this entertaining read from Hunter Davies chronicling his early years and marriage and the beginnings of his journalistic career. I was surprised how many of the author's experiences echoed my own in spite of Davies being some 15 years older than myself. It was a much slower moving world back then!. Davies didn't have the easiest start in life but became one of the working class boys of the period who made it in spite of all the odds to University. Davies is a very honest narrator detailing his own shortcomings and the strained relationship with his father who was struck down by m.s. prematurely and is bedridden for much of the narrative Suffused throughout the memoir is his obvious love and admiration for his recently deceased wife who attended Oxford university and became the successful and much loved novelist Margaret Forster.

[Susan Leona Fisher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Listened to the audio book read by Cameron Stewart of this autobiography taking us up to the author’s early twenties and his marriage to Margaret Forster. Hunter Davies is around 10 years older than me and my husband. We listened to a chapter a day and there were many memories and echoes of our own upbringing. We too were first generation university and remember post-war rationing. Having lived in Carlisle, North Cumbria, Manchester and North London, and knowing Durham quite well, there were further connections for us there. He puts across the privilege and opportunities of the ‘grammar school generation’ and the poignancy and privations of a home-life dominated by the long-term illness of his father. He also made us laugh out loud.

[Jane · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was nostalgic but lacked something.

Interesting story and interesting to learn about the author wife Margaret Forster and was lucky and privileged to go to university when his peers were destined for factories become apprentices or national service.

I found the education part interesting and how universities have come on - especially Durham which is one of the elite universities.

I was brought up in the late 60s and could relate to the Scottish relatives and how damaged some were in my experience through hardship and two wars.

I felt once Hunter left home his family did not appear to have any bearing and maybe that was meant it is hard to identify.

I found the author interesting and will read another of his books. Sadly this lacked something.

[Ron · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is the first part of the memoirs of Hunter Davies, the writer, journalist and biographer. It takes us from his birth in the 1930s, through the war, university life in the 50s, first jobs in journalism and finishes in 1960 with his marriage to Margaret Forster, the celebrated novelist who died last year.
Like all good memoirs, this combines personal reflections and memories with pieces of social history, and he writes with humour and at a fast pace.
I enjoyed comparing his life to mine, eleven years his junior, seeing many similarities but also differences in the intervening years. I look forward to the next instalment.

[Brenda Ray · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this and used to like his column years ago when I had time to read Sunday papers... There's a lot of social history in the earlier part of the book which would be of use to anyone studying the immediate post War period. I can just about relate to this, though am quite a bit younger, but things like rationing seemed to drag on for ages. The book tends to drag on a bit too, though, once we get to the leaving school and going to college/starting work era, but maybe that's just me being less able to relate to this part. It's written with a great deal of dry humour and a refreshing lack of agony and sensationalism. Nothing wrong with that.

[Colin Bardsley · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not sure why I read this. I'm a fan of Davies' Beatles biography but that isn't enough to make me read his own memoir. Maybe it was the Co-op part of the title which, as a Co-op employee, piqued my interest a bit. Nevertheless, I wasn't bored but I also wasn't gripped either. Probably would only recommend to people who can identify with Davies in some way - either people of a similar age (he's 81), people from the places Davies has lived and are therefore described in the memoir (mainly Carlisle and Manchester), or people interested in journalism.

[Michael Rumney · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting enough about growing up in Carlisle but until Davies gets to be a journalist in Manchester towards the end of this book does it become really engaging and may be because my father worked as a photographer just before 1960 in Manchester and would have known some of the names mentioned by the author.
A tad repetitive especially about his time at Durham University. Like myself Davies admits to being a poor speller which didn't hinder his progress as a writer.
What comes across well is writing is more about perspiration than inspiration.

[PeterBlackCoach · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this book on an English friend's recommendation as it was an insight into struggle and resilience post WW2 in England - and how a positive disposition was helpful. Resilience is a declining attribute in today's economy and society - yet it was harder back then. This will be a useful addition to my coaching resources to provide perspective for my clients. rated 3/5 as did get a bit repetitive and being an autobiography, was a little too focused on self !

[Jacqueline Evans · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very much enjoyed the story. Much of his childhood story is familiar ground from 1950s stories. I particularly enjoyed his descriptions of his time at Durham University, but it's my home town so I enjoyed hearing how he went on there in the 1950s. A pub I used to go to in the 1980s got a mention (The Buffalo for any Durham people reading this). The rest of his coming of age, early career and meeting his wife to be were good too.

[Michele · Rating 5 out of 5]

A gallop of a read and thoroughly enjoyable. Don't know why I was surprised at how different his writing was to his wife's, Margaret Forster. Ridiculous really. Anyway very entertaining and I just delighted in how much the love for Margaret shone out. They were so real. Looking forward to the next episode.

[Wendy Campbell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Lovely story from Hunter, written in the honest, matter-of-fact style that we are used to. I especially loved his generous sharing of his growing up, with all the fears and worries that we all experience as we develop into adults.

With thanks to Hunter, and to Tricia McCrow for giving me this book:-)

[Kathleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Four stars for the first part, which brought back so many memories of that time as I’m only a few years younger than the author. University was interesting too as I was the first in my family or village to go…. But the second half barely held my interest (which I suppose shows I’m more interested in my memories than his.) So three stars.

[Alastair · Rating 4 out of 5]

Gentle, readable memoir

Hunter Davies's skill as a writer and journalist is that he draws the reader into his pieces with a style that is straightforward and clear. This is a highly readable and interesting account of his early life.

[Jo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Superb evocation of life in a Northern town and growing up in the post-war years in Britain. It's also something of a love story and how one young man started out on his career as a journalist. A 'must read' for Margaret Forster fans.

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting insight into growing up during WW2. Hunter Davies is one of the folks on my fantasy dinner party list, he seems to have lived such an interesting life. This book covers the earliest part of that life.

[Darla Ebert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very well written. This is a compelling memoir that really pulls the reader in, that's what you want. I could have done without his more cringe-worthy sharing about his attempts at getting a girlfriend in his puberty-ridden years. Too much anatomical description.