Danziger's Britain: A Journey to the Edge

by Nick Danziger

Nick Danziger began his journey in June 1994, as newspapers and magazines throughout the land commemorated the 50th anniversary of the D-Day landings and recalled the Allies' war aims (to afford assurance that all men in all lands may live out their lives in freedom from fear and want).

Genres: Nonfiction, Travel, British Literature, History

368 pages, Paperback

First published September 19, 1996

Reviews

[James Barker · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was more than a little frustrating. Back in 1994, Danziger, a photographer, decided to investigate the UK's underclass and, unsurprisingly, found it in every direction he turned. While there were some local variations to the cause and nature of the poverty he encountered, there is an overwhelming sense of forgotten communities, with elders grieving over dead industries and lost security while the young, who have never known any better, escape the hopelessness through crime, drug and alcohol use.

The stories detailed in the book may come as a surprise to some but to anyone who has grown up in former industrial towns there is nothing new here. I grew up on a council estate in a languishing Midlands town that, at its height, had been exceedingly wealthy, the world leader in its industry of choice. This wealth did not trickle down to the majority of the town's inhabitants in any meaningful way (the great lie of capitalism is that wealth is downwardly mobile) so they, of course, feel the brunt of decades of economic decline. Having to return to that estate to fulfil 3 years of family duty 20 years after I had left I found a place ravaged by neglect. The rot had been allowed to continue, the only difference was the proliferation of superstores, the dreaded shopping parks (not the investment that the average council estate dweller needs). Walking the dog I saw sights such as: young men shooting up in wasteland behind the local library (now barely open due to cuts), secret Muslim drinkers supping their Stella from cans, gangs on the roof of the community centre stealing its metal. The smell of marijuana was everywhere and people pointed out the crackhouses of the area, one a few doors away from my family home. When I bumped into former school friends, people I hadn't seen since the age of 11, I was surprised how tired and ill they looked, old before their time.

I got out again just as soon as I could but methods of escape don't exist for many people in these areas. Danziger captures much of this but, aping the nature of the lives of the people he records, it becomes repetitive and could do with serious editing. The writer also has the habit of putting himself in the centre of things- well, just look at the title, the colonising 'Danziger's Britain.' Half-American, half-Brit, he found many places and people more accessible because he wasn't pure-Brit. I actually found his photos offered great insights into the lives he tried to record and it was the strength of these that pushed this up to 3 stars. It's important that Danziger undertook this project but it could have been better, more stream-lined, and there is a big hole in his record that neglects most of the Midlands, which I found strange considering it was the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution- the very thing that shook everything up, creating immense wealth and degradation, hand in hand. 20 years on from publication a tour similar to the one Danziger undertook would produce survey results not dissimilar. Whole communities on the edge, fractured families, rampant escapism through drug and alcohol use, the fear of violence and theft, chronic ill health. Hopelessness, in one word. I'd like Danziger to suggest how that could change but I guess the nature of photography is recording how things are, not how they could be.

[minnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read this a few years ago,a travel book with a difference.The writer travels around Britain and Northern Ireland to cities and small towns,visiting the no-go areas where he meets drug dealers, street kids, the homeless and various poverty stricken people on the fringes of society.I remember this book as being a real eye opener, and also a fairly depressing but well written look at modern society.

[Gary · Rating 5 out of 5]

Worth a read but if you lived through it you probably wouldn't want to be reminded

[Darla Ebert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Astonishing in scope and informative to a gloomy degree. That is, the author truly put himself at risk to get the notes and conclusions at which he arrived. The awful lives of the people living on the fringes in Great Britain truly makes one's flesh crawl. Drugs cause a multitude of other problems affecting anyone within its relentless scope. I was both glad for this expose' as it points out the very real dangers, and depressed because this peek into the lives of those studied by the author is a very real in-depth look into the lives of Americans, and not just for those living in squalor and hopelessness.

[Georgina Collins · Rating 4 out of 5]

Initially a very enjoyable, if bleak, read, and then an exercise in resilience as the relentlessly depressing stories kept on coming - but I think that this perfectly communicates the scale of the issues Danziger describes. I would have liked some towns to have been included; Danziger visits cities and rural areas, but not the 'in between' places like, for example, Workington or Burnley.

[Jonathan Budd · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bleak!

[Tariq Mahmood · Rating 4 out of 5]

For someone like me, raised in a third world country with a history of being colonized for hundreds of years by Britain, the mere thought that poverty even exists in Great Britain was blasphemous. Nick;s anthropological study of the poor and the destitute is certainly an eye opener.

If I compare the poor from my native country (Pakistan) to the lives of the poor in Nick's Britain, the striking difference is that the Pakistani poor are well adjusted in their limited surroundings unlike British poor who seem to be new to poverty, victims of the end of the industrial age. The other difference is that the Pakistani poor rely on religion while the British seem to escape in drugs.

There are many sad stories in the book with few good ones with communities trying to organize themselves to fight their poverty. Nick has tried to keep a thread going but there are so many similar stories over and over again that after a while the narrative becomes monotonous, or is it me? Still not ready to believe that Britain can be poor?

[sisterimapoet · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked the approach of this book, the way the author went to each place without a clear plan of what he would do, or who he would talk to. It allowed for stories to emerge without feeling people were put under a spotlight.

However by the end of the book I did feel a bit bleaked out, by essentially hearing the same story retold time and time again with only slight differences as to the why and the how if not the what.

I also kept dwelling on the lingering question - this book was written over 10 years ago - have these places got better or worse since then?

[Hazel · Rating 5 out of 5]

A stark picture of real life in the most disadvantaged areas of Britain

[Doug Geier · Rating 4 out of 5]

Scary and creepy--I read this on a trip in England--it got soaked in a downpour and swelled to twice its original width

[Lucy · Rating 2 out of 5]

I only read two of the chapters, on the Scottish highlands and Glasgow. Even just reading those, I could tell I wouldn't like the rest of the book. I felt it was kind of shallow.