Three Stories by Alan Bennett

I failed to count how many of our members joined this meeting but there was a good turn out. Lively and enthusiastic conversation flowed, and the group opinion of Alan Bennett glowed!

Each of the three stories were cited as 'my favourite' by different members. 

The Laying on of Hands takes the reader into a memorial service, full of colourful and high profile 'mourners' observed by an undercover archdeacon who takes great delight in following the highs and lows of the service. This is a 'comic' story. 

The Clothes They Stood Up In is an hilarious, and quite insane, story of a couple who find themselves in extremely unusual circumstance, and later (much to our amusement) in Aylesbury!  This is a 'funny yet sad' story.

Father! Father! Burning Bright containing black humour surrounding illness and death. This is a 'very sad' story that, for some of our group 'touched a nerve'.

All three stories were meticulous observations of human nature and written so well that it is difficult not to love the writing, even if you don't like the stories themselves.

The conversation flitted between the three stories but generally came back to Mr and Mrs Ransome and their relationship (or lack of it). We debated the Aylesbury ring-road comment as only locals can, but agreed that he chose his 'bland' town exceptionally well.

It is hard to work out what the authors attitude is to his characters, but we all agreed that he is 'waspish' toward them. He leaves the reader feeling quite uncomfortable about these feeble people but, we believe, that is alright and probably how he intended us to feel. 

Some read with Alan Bennett's voice in their head, some are ardent fans and enjoyed reading this book for a second (or possibly more) time. 

Now, I make an admission - I struggled with the first story, thoroughly enjoyed the second and couldn't finish the third. I expected a downbeat meeting of our book group. By the end of our discussion I realised that what I had read was high quality, inspired literature written by an author worthy of the huge following he has. This is a brilliant choice for a book group read.

Would we recommended this book? Yes.

Our next read is My Name is Why by Lemm Sissay. We will meet on 17th December, at 8pm, by Zoom to discuss and to choose our Christmas book from a selection of what will aim to be ho, ho, ho novels!