THE ROTTERS’ CLUB

The first of a two-volume portrait of 1970s England, focused here by the prizewinning Coe (The House of Sleep, 1998, etc.) on a circle of four Birmingham schoolmates.

Perhaps it is a delusion to suppose that we write our own histories. The author seems to suggest so by unfolding his narrative from the perspective of the children of two of the protagonists, who meet in Berlin, in 2003, and reminisce about their parents, who were young so long ago, in “a world without mobiles or videos or Playstations or even faxes.” The friends—Phillip, Benjamin, Harding, and Douglas—met at King William’s, a “fucking toff’s academy” in Birmingham, during the dreary decade that brought bad clothes, racial guilt, and good stereo systems to the farthest corners of the Queen’s realm. The early 1970s were dominated by labor strife, the unions taking a final bow and bringing down governments and paralyzing life for everyone with their strikes. Not all of the boys at King William’s are preppie brats, however—Douglas’s father Bill Anderton works at the troubled British Leyland factory—and even their fustiest schoolmasters support the Labour Party. The most reactionary elements in Birmingham, in fact, are to be found farther down the social scale, in those like shop steward Roy Slater (Bill Anderton’s nemesis) and his racist friends from the National Front. Much of the historical background—the wedding of Princess Anne, for example, or the political fall of Enoch Powell—may be unfamiliar to Americans, but the story’s basic outlines (young people discovering the world and following the course of their lives) are amiable and clear. Eventually, the focus becomes the shy Benjamin and his hopeless love for Cicely. There’s a happy ending of sorts, but plenty of questions wait for Part II.

Tasty but filling: a rich (too rich, perhaps) portrait of a time and a place that have received less than their fair share of literary attention.