Our Glasgow: Memories of Life in Disappearing Britain

Description

This oral history of Glasgow spans most of the last century a time of economic downturn and eventual renewal, in which the many communities making up the city experienced upheavals that tore some apart and brought others closer together. It tells of the beating heart of no mean city in the words of the people who made it what it is. Piers Dudgeon has listened to dozens of people who remember the city as it was, and who have lived through its many changes. They talk of childhood and education, of work and entertainment, of family, community values, health, politics, religion and music. Their stories will make you laugh and cry. It is people's own memories that make history real and this engrossing book captures them vividly.

Piers Dudgeon is the author of many works of non-fiction. He worked for ten years as an editor in London, before starting his own publishing company producing books with authors as diverse as John Fowles, Catherine Cookson, Peter Ackroyd, Daphne du Maurier, Shirley Conran, Ted Hughes and Susan Hill. Subsequently, he left London for Yorkshire and has written books about Catherine Cookson (a no. 1 best-seller), Barbara Taylor Bradford, Josephine Cox, J. M. Barrie and Daphne du Maurier, the lateral thinker Edward de Bono, and the composer Sir John Tavener.

It makes for surprisingly satisfying, if sometimes shocking, reading - The Scotsman Dudgeon has hit on the winning formula of allowing the history of a place to reverberate through the voices of its citizenry - Jenni Frazer, The Jewish Chronicle There is much of substance in Our Glasgow. It is written clearly and...it has strong individual voices...It is also brisk. This has its attractions as Dudgeon bounds through his topics with energy and...erudition...[T]he old Glasgow appeals, if not as a reality then as an idea drenched in warming nostalgia...One can look back in anger, astonishment or admiration. One can laugh at the troubles and be lifted by the strength of our ancestors - The Herald