A Temporary Life

by David Storey

After seven plays and four novels, all widely acclaimed, David Storey now presents a first-person account of certain incidents in the temporary life of Colin Freestone, a one-time professional boxer turned artist. On the occasion of his wife's breakdown, Freestone returns with her to her home town in the norther and takes a job in the local art school. Here we meet a whole gallery of startlingly realised teachers and students, presided over by David Storey's most comic creation to date, R. N. 'Skipper' Wilcox, a man who equates food with art, art with the past, and the past with his own idiosyncratic passions and vices. Then there are the Newmans who have arrived, ostensibly, to transform the town: Elizabeth, the wife, on the lookout for pleasure; Rebecca, the daughter, on the lookout for experience; and Neville Newman himself, a city planner, on the lookout, with his strange and menacing gang, for authority and power. Like some gigantic happening, unannounced, unrehearsed - convened perhaps, thought one is never sure, by Freestone himself - these characters, shadowed by the disturbing presence of Freestone's wife, trace out a compulsive and at times seemingly ungovernable pattern. By turns hilarious, tragic and shocking, the novel progresses towards a climax which both mirrors and transforms, like a work of art, the lives of everyone involved.

Genres: Fiction, British Literature

256 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1973

About the author

David Storey was an English playwright, screenwriter, award-winning novelist and a former professional rugby league player. Storey was born in Wakefield, Yorkshire in 1933, and studied at the Slade School of Art.

His first two novels were both published in 1960, a few months apart: This Sporting Life, which won the Macmillan Fiction Award and was adapted for an award-winning 1963 film, and Flight Into Camden, which won the Somerset Maugham Award. His next novel, Radcliffe (1963) met with widespread critical acclaim in both England and the United States, and during the 1960s and 70s, Storey became widely known for his plays, several of which achieved great success.

He returned to fiction in 1972 with Pasmore, which won the Geoffrey Faber Memorial Award and was short-listed for the Booker Prize. Saville (1976) won the Booker Prize and has been hailed by at least one critic as the best of all the Booker winners. His last novel was Thin-Ice Skater (2004).

David Storey lived in London. He was married and had four children.

Reviews

[Francis Bruynseels · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredible lack of recognition, I read this 1973 book in about 1985 - it seemed ancient then. It was at a second hand bookshop either in South France or North Italy on a holiday to Florence. A fantastic book to read, and a great achievement to write. The style is a bit out of the ordinary but easy to read. The story is gripping and moving, especially the wife who can't take the cruelty of the world. The hero's pugnaciousness is a bit shocking at first but very thought provoking and memorable.

As I write in June 2014 I notice that this book has two ratings and no reviews. It deserves a thousand times the readership. If David Storey reads this site he must be flabbergasted by this book's lack of readers. You wonder if he thinks it was worth writing the book at all.

I understand that there is a play "Life Class" drawn from the same materials. I must get to see it.

One problem looking back is that all these working class post war British writers seem to merge into each other - I spent some time looking for Alan Sillitoe as the author.

[Chris Jordan Downes · Rating 3 out of 5]

I stumbled upon this book in a charity shop recently and was intrigued by the blurb:
'Colin Freestone, ex-professional boxer, has forsaken the Noble Art to teach Fine Art in a provincial town. Remote at first from the threatening atmosphere of greed and pretension, he is later drawn into violent confrontation, battling against the forces of modern evil like a legendary knight; but without the shining armour.'

It's an absorbing read which successfully combines that age-old blend of tragedy and comedy (Storey's description of the dinner at Wilcox's is superb!). It's very much representative of the period and portrays the post-war growing pains of the country in the form of Neville Newman (much better described as a speculative developer than a 'city planner' as suggested in the description) as he cements over the countryside in the name of 'revitalisation'.

The main character, Colin Freestone, has the rebellious spirit of a film noir anti-hero, valiantly (and at times amusingly mischievously) trying to make sense of the cards he has been dealt, often with violence, but always with integrity. As with all good anti-heroes, every reader can see a bit of the character's nature in themselves and Freestone is no exception in that respect.

I am in full agreement with the previous reviewer in suggesting the novel is very much under appreciated.