About a month ago I was getting ready for work, one morning, and I heard, on the radio, that Sue Townsend had just died and while my usual routine of getting out of the house is ‘rushed’ (polite term for anything but) I stood still for the very briefest of moments. You know when everything stops and you just feel sad, but more for yourself than anything? My drive to the office, that morning, was silent as I thought of a writer that seemed timeless, a part of my reading adolescence and somebody who’s characters would simply stand still for ever. I actually knew nothing about Townsend herself (though you could probably take a second guess as to her politics after reading one or two of her novels) probably because her books were always larger than life - Her characters had such a strong sense of presence there never seemed to be any reason to know more about their author. Tragically, her life was short with a brief formal education (started reading at 8 and dropping out of school at 15) and some head on confrontation with poverty alongside a battery of illnesses (diabetes, TB, heart failure, kidney failure, a stroke, arthritis and blindness - the latter to which she described as “throwing words into darkness”). Thankfully, for us, however, she kept writing till near the end!I decided to re-read the Queen and I - a book with which I remember laughing hard about 20 years ago! I felt it was a good testament to her satirical wit and for me, the highlight of her writing career. So, I’d say it is, of course, a very easy read - extremely easy but probably because laughing just keeps you moving through it. Be warned, however - there are some subtle and darker themes and I’ll get to those later. The premise behind this one is that there’s a general election in England and, horror of horrors, a republican wins. His first duty is to, well, banish the royal family to a council estate (ie project housing). The entire family (mostly) decamps to Hellebore Close (or Hell Close as its locally called). For the most part the family are so unprepared for this sort of life. Prince Philip literally ‘takes to his bed’, suffering from depression. The Queen Mother seems to somewhat cope, but clearly is so removed from events (and other than her still willingness to bet on horses) that she’s almost a tragic role in her innocence. Prince Charles takes to his vegetable garden but is arrested and sent to jail along the way while his two sons get lost in the shuffle of a mediocre education, hanging out with local gangs of children and the excitement of ‘roughing it’. Princess Anne seems to somewhat adapt (arriving at her house with a toolbox and being able to do her own plumbing), though she does become romantically entangled with a local ‘gypsy’, who, in turn, is delighted that her advanced snooker skills can beat all his friends at the local pub. Diana is simply useless with no financial management skills but is still flattered to be adored by her new neighbors. The Queen herself does manage to adapt though faces new challenges - poverty, living on government assistance, dealing with public hospital wards - as well as the typical ones - having to dress oneself, cook one’s own food, etc etc. Her commentary, however, is the most insightful and provides the social criticism which Townsend probably looked for in her characters - The, often, futile voice of the working class so even as a large group they still aren’t heard (or least listened to), the never ending circle of poverty, Government bureaucracy, a class structure which continues to feed into a sense of adoration of the wealthy (particularly Royalty) - which in itself is particularly tragic because the wealthy clearly don’t give a toss about their working class countrymen. All that aside, I think the dialogue is satirical wit at its brilliance. There are too many references or quotes but a few had me up at night laughing so hard. So much so, I had to highlight them. Charles is now in prison. His letters/accounts home to either his mother or his wife include:Please bring me some books. I am not allowed to use the prison library yet. And I dependent on my cellmates, Lee Christmas, Fat Oswald and Carlton Moses’, tastes in reading material. They do not share my move of literature, indeed last night I had to explain to them what literature was, or rather is. Lee Christmas thought that literature was something you poured in a cat’s tray. At present we are locked up for twenty-three hours a day. There are not enough prison officers to supervise educational or work programmes. Diana’s letter in return: pps. Sonny christmas died in his sleep last night Sad, isn’t i! William got fourteen per cent in a maths exam. I told his form tutor that nobody is good at maths in our family, but he said ‘You seemed to be able to work your income tax out all right’. What did he mean?Charles’ cell mate (Fat Oswald):Later that morning, when Fat Oswald returned from his creative writing class, he handed Charles a piece of paper saying, ‘Its for you, to cheer you up’. Charles raised himself from him bunk, took the paper from Oswald’s pudgy hand and read: OutsideOutside is cakes and tins of popAnd you can go into a shopTo buy the chocolates that you life, or training shoes: the best is NikeOutside is flowers and trees galoreIf we could leave the prison door.There is girls with pretty faceswe could take them to nice places.Outside is where we want to be, Charlie, Carlton, Lee and me.‘I say, it's frightfully good, Oswalt’, said charles, who certainly agreed with the sentiments the poem expressed, though he abhorred the banality of the construction. and again: Carlton was writing to his wife, and stopped frequently to ask Charles the spellings of the words: ‘enough’, ‘lubrication’, ‘because’, ‘nipples’, ‘recreation’, ‘Tuesday’ and ‘parole’.
Sue Townsend ... niet mijn favoriete schrijfster, maar iedereen verdient nog een kans en toen ik de inhoud van dit boek las, leek het mij wel iets. Ook de cover was leuk. Er stond vermeld 'laugh-out-loud funny', maar daar laat ik mij niet meer aan vangen. Het is al vaker bewezen dat niet iedereen hetzelfde gevoel voor humor heeft en dus nam ik mij voor om mijn eigen mening te vormen. Dit keer had de 'Sunday Telegraph' het wel bij het juiste einde. Nu ja, laugh-out-loud' is er misschien iets over, maar humor zit er zeker in. Het leest ook super vlot want in een mum van tijd had ik al 50 bladzijdes verslonden.Rond de helft van het boek komt er, voor mij, even een dipje, maar het totaalpakket schetst wel echt hoe mensen die, hun hele leven op hun wenken bediend werden, zich zouden gedragen nu ze plots zelfstandig moeten zijn. Wat mij dan, anderzijds, een beetje verbaasd, is dat de leden van de Koninklijke Familie zo geschetst mogen worden. Ik dacht dat de Engelsen daar strenger zouden op geweest zijn. Wij kregen een humoristisch boek voorgeschoteld, maar ik vond het er toch wel wat over in bepaalde situaties. Voor mij moet humor voor iedereen grappig zijn. Als er mensen belachelijk worden gemaakt, dan vind ik het jammer. Ik zou niet graag in hun schoenen staan. Niemand wordt graag gekwetst, toch? Dat is natuurlijk mijn visie. Andere mensen die het boek lazen of willen lezen, staan er misschien totaal anders tegenover. Ik kan daarom alleen zeggen : laat je niet leiden door mijn opinie. Ben je benieuwd geworden, dan kan je het het best zelf lezen.ConclusieIk heb toch een beetje een dubbel gevoel. Het was soms echt wel grappig, maar af en toe had ik toch ook iets van : nee, hier zie ik de humor niet van in. Natuurlijk is het een Engels boek en ligt hier het verschil? Engelse humor is, in mijn ogen, niet altijd even grappig, maar dat is natuurlijk persoonlijk. Heb ik er van genoten? Ja en nee en daarom 2 sterren.
What do You think about The Queen And I (2002)?
I do love this book. It's brilliant fun and very funny. I think she did it better in the next one, though, and The Queen and I now seems very dated - I'd forgotten completely Prince Edward's theatrical career, and the rumours that he was gay; and although Diana is nowadays viewed as a wronged woman and a saint, for many years she was perceived as little more than a clothes horse married to a basically kind man, and that's reflected here.So it's also a little slice of history. And even though it is a protest book, railing against the fact that the UK has a privileged royal family diverting tax revenues from supporting really disadvantaged families, Sue can't quite manage to make the queen herself as unsympathetic a character as I think she would have liked to.It doesn't really matter. It's still worth a read.
—Deborah
Britain has established a new Republican government and the various members of the royal family have been evicted from their palaces and relegated to council (slum) housing. Queen Elizabeth and her mum are doing quite nicely in their new circumstances, actually, stiff upper lip and all that. Diana is shopping for trendy cast-offs at the local Oxfam and Anne is revelling in new-found romance. Charles calls himself "Charlie Teck" (maiden name of Great-Grandmother Queen Mary) and has allowed his infatuation with a buxom next-door blonde to embroil him in a tawdry alley brawl. The Queen's corgis are running with a rough crowd. Prince Philip refuses to get out of bed. Can the Windsors learn to cope with life on the dole, cook their own meals, and find change for the bus? A side-splittingly hilarious fantasy!
—Nora Branch Library
I read this book when it was released and really loved it. To me it was actually a book about poverty and inequality, which I thought through her devices of using humour and the royal family she did a good job of throwing into relief. I've not read it since then, and can see how the satire will have dated.
—Davida Chazan
