I have said elsewhere that Tony Harrison was the perfect 1980s British liberal. However, there is one caveat: he had sympathy with White working-class English people who felt marginalised by mass immigration. This was voiced in a poem that will be examined here and, more mutedly, in his 1987 film-poem
Thanks so much for returning to the work of Tony Harrison. After your last piece on his work, I felt I was a bit harsh on Harrison in the comment I left. I speculated on whether he was one of those boomers that doesn’t care as they’ll be dead by the time all hell is let loose. I agree with you - I think this poem shows that he does care about what happens to the white working class from whence he came. It’s an incredibly moving piece. Harrison did not sentimentalise the white working class either - his depiction of the wife beater next door was all too real.
Like you, I feel frustrated that he and others can’t take that final step and actually come out and say that mass immigration has been a disaster and a crime against all of us. He’s 87 years’ old now - what would it cost him to tell the truth?
‘And so the kingdom of Gondor sank into ruin, the line of kings failed, the white tree withered and the rule of Gondor was given over to lesser men.’ - JRR Tolkien
I'm glad you like this, LoS. There will be quite a few Harrison essays, maybe ten. It's an on-going series and half of them have been begun already. https://millennialwoes.substack.com/p/grim-rhymer
To answer your question... At his age, I think he can only be worried about his reputation/legacy.
That’s so good to read. I think it’s great you are discussing his work - poetry is too often overlooked. I always admired Harrison for refusing to sentimentalise the lives of the white working class. In the film-poem ‘Prometheus’ (1998) the statue of Prometheus has been made from the melting down of miners’ bodies, alluding to the horrific illness, if not death, that they suffered as a result of going down the pits. Sometimes it can be easy, from our current abysmal viewpoint, to idealise the past. I still remember ‘Prometheus’ being screened on Channel 4 in 1998, at peak viewing time - how far culture has fallen since then. This was a world before the horrors of reality tv of course….
I've never actually seen Prometheus, but it was a mini documentary about it in 1998 that first made me aware of TH. I will be watching the film finally soon, so as to write an essay about it.
I’ll be so interested to read that! ‘Prometheus’ is a very powerful piece. It’s set in a bleak post-industrial landscape that is very clearly Yorkshire after the miners’ strike of 1984. It’s full of classical allusions - I recall reading that Harrison was very influenced by Shelley’s poem ‘Prometheus Unbound’ also. I was at university in 1998 doing my doctorate; there was a good deal of academic excitement around this new work by Harrison, especially the fact that it was addressing the decline of the working class. Left wing academics were still concerned with such things back then Woes - these were the days before identity politics of course…and the miners’ strike was still relatively recent in the collective memory.
Definitely. The predator class have done nicely out of it. Just one such example - Churchill’s grandson Rupert Soames, the CEO of the disgusting SERCO, an outsourcing company that basically does all the government’s dirty deeds for them. SERCO have been trying to buy up all available property for the housing of those that have come to replace the British. I had some dealings with them, when they offered to buy my old house in Yorkshire. They are the worst scumbags imaginable. Soames epitomises the predator class. He’s doing very nicely, thanks.
Sounds like Blackrock in America. And of course the Soames/Churchill family has form for selling out the country for personal Gold, as was (encouragingly) alluded to by the historian Daryll Cooper on the Tucker Carlson show recently. Is it just me or is it becoming slightly less verboten to mention the youknowwhos?
Definitely. The damage that SERCO has done, for instance, is incalculable. They have their grubby fingers in every pie. Once the decision was made by government to outsource what had once been seen as essential service, the door was opened for the wolves. Now these ghastly bean counters run everything and they have no love for us.
It beautifully illustrates the deep melancholy that has overtaken so many Northern towns—fuelled by the slow, intentional erosion of the tightly woven social fabric that once defined working-class England.
What really strikes me is how it goes beyond just the demographic changes, delving into the widespread sense of tension and alienation experienced by those of us who feel their sense of belonging and identity is being erased—not merely by the presence of foreign nations, but by the broader socio-political forces that allowed this transformation to take root.
The post is a stark reminder of the emotional and psychological toll that such sociological upheavals have on the people who once formed the backbone of these communities.
The issue of elderly people being unable to move out or being 'left behind' isn’t discussed nearly enough. It’s a cold ‘thanks’ from the government to people who’ve likely worked their entire lives. I think this is part of why the 'right' is so intent on dismantling the image of Churchill. I'm not a fifth columnist, but the smoke and mirrors, Simpsons' monorail man platitudes about the UK have to end.
Here’s something I always keep in mind when talking about mortgages: You don’t just invest in a 'home'; you invest in a community and the surrounding area. That IS your home - don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. In the past, proximity to work, whether it was a 'good area,' and whether your kids got into a good school were the main concerns. Now it’s about, 'Will my street and neighborhood remain stable?' or 'Will I actually be surrounded by my own people?' These shouldn’t even be questions anyone has to ask - it was once a given. Surely, a government wouldn’t allow this because it doesn’t make sense? But here we are. If they can’t promise me that in 30 years I’ll still be living in more or less the same place, just with a few improvements, then they can get to fuck. I don’t care if you’re a doctor or a janitor, that should be a basic promise, and I don't see that promise being kept. In fact it's so simple a premise that you shouldn't even have to explain it further than financial reasons never mind anything else.
I was going to end this by saying that, as Scottish people, we like to tell ourselves, 'We’ll never get like that,' or 'we’re not England.' But honestly? Even the most apolitical people in my life are talking about this now. Blokes from my town, who in any other time would be the most boring people imaginable (writing letters about potholes to the local paper, the library opening times) are now talking about 'the West' as a whole. This should be funny in a small-town way because it's such a 180, but it's a sobering reality that women and kids (and even vulnerable adult males) are feeling unsafe walking into town because of these hotels, and via legal means has led to more unsafe and less tight-knit communities.
You’d think there’d be a sense of ‘people are waking up,’ but instead, it just makes me feel sick. You’ve been warning people about this publicly for, what, 10 years now? People in our towns and villages shouldn’t even have to think about these things. It shouldn’t have to be this way.
...'he has been told on numerous occasions he is not welcome.'
And here is where the rubber meets the road. It's at this point, when the immigrants force out the natives at knife point, that even the NPCs become aware what has happened--and that it's too late to do anything about it.
The only options remaining are, well, left unspoken, for the moment.
Very interesting (as ever), your range as a writer is impressive.
There's a disturbing "calm before the storm" numbness in places like Leeds, most whites don't want to seem racist, and until recently the invasion was gradual enough to seem fairly trivial, so you'll find most whites just kind of ignore it, work around it, don't go into certain areas. It's as if you had a big garden and part of it became swampy, midge-ridden, you don't really know what to do so just avoid that part; unfortunately, that part is spreading rapidly and it has a beard and a machete.
A friend from Bradford told me there's a line of demarcation north of Bradford, towns like Shipley: everything south is Pakistani Muslim, everything north is white; as he put it, chuckling, "it's a line defined and held by hatred."
I've often noticed whites (especially older ones) are deeply uneasy about the invasion; they feel it in their bones, you might say - and yet they can be perfectly friendly to individual swarthoids. That's one of the weird and horrible things, that there are individual e.g. Hindus who are far better (nicer, more decent, more intelligent) than our homegrown chavs, but even if every single swarthoid were lovely the numbers make it an invasion, and invasions tend to end badly for one side.
The "numbness", as if whites are deadening their own sensitivity to what they're losing, is not going to last.
It's heart breaking to read this. It's happening all over the Western World. Hidden (mostly white) overlords are destroying the white middle class in Europe and America. Dumping 20,000 Haitians in mostly White Springfield Ohio, is just one example. These people are all being brought here to replace the native white citizens. The new comers are from Thugocracies and have no history nor experience of self-government. Both of the two neighborhoods I grew up on are not totally black ghettos with the houses so neglected and beaten down that the only way to move forward would be to flatten them with tractors.
Thanks for that Morgoth. My great grandfather and grandfather lived on Tempest Road. Number 88. I was brought up on the other side of Cross Flatts Park on the “Parkfields” I left in 1967 and never went back.
It's amazing you know Tempest Road, and Cross Flatts Park. Tony Harrison did another poem, Shrapnel, which mentions both, and that prompted me to write a separate essay about the park. That will be published alongside the essay on Shrapnel, early next year. What, if anything, can you remember about the park?
I spent ages playing in there. My nursery was in the middle of the park, asbestos prefabs. There used to be large square stone blocks, which we used to try and reach when we were sledging. There was also some slides, swings and roundabouts. I went to Cross Flatts junior school. We used to have to march down the park to the kitchen, dining room, this was at the bottom of Tempest Road, Dewsbury Road. There was also a small tuck shop at the bottom of the park. My mate Norman Pilling used to get a tube of fruit pastilles from there every day. We sat next to each other, so marched down to dinner together. I used to try and scrounge some off him, he only ever let me have the Green ones.
Thanks for replying. The park had various things initially, that seem to have disappeared as it went downhill. There was a bandstand, an aviary, a greenhouse and a pavilion building, the Watsonian Pavilion. Do you remember any of those?
What was the "atmosphere" of the park at that time? Was it rough, dangerous, etc.? It definitely seems to have gone that way in the 80s and 90s.
I don’t remember any of those. It certainly wasn’t rough or dangerous. Though the demographics were very different,being entirely white working class. I remember that the streets were cobbled on the Parkfields. Tempest Road was considered quite posh and it was not unusual to be shood off. They seemed to know that you were not from there. Sorry I cannot remember more, memories fade. Looking forward to your next piece.
Interesting article and I can fully appreciate that when a whole neighbourhood is over-run it must be very upsetting for the last elderly white resident.
However sometimes new non-white neighbours can be a blessing.
My parents lived most of their married life in South West London and saw huge and not very welcome changes.
After my father died my mother put the house on the market and eventually left London - which none of us had enjoyed living in - to move in with my sister in Plymouth.
During the period between my father's death and my mother selling up an evangelical West Indian Christian family moved in next door and proved an absolute Godsend for my mother.
Not only were they extremely house proud and enthusiastic gardeners but also took it upon themselves to watch over my mother.
Their eldest son would come round in the summer to mow her lawn and do any heavy lifting jobs for her.
They were always dropping off cakes and other home baked goods.
If they did not see her for a few days they would knock on the door just to make sure she was OK.
My mother was in her early 70s and rather shy so my sister and I - who no longer lived in London - were very relieved she had such kind and responsible neighbours.
The whole family were fully employed Church going Christians - law abiding with beautiful old-fashioned manners and values.
Sadly a significant number of immigrants are nothing like this family.
A great many West Indians are not remotely law abiding.
Christianity is the founding faith of these fair isles and Islam is entirely alien.
Many older generation West Indians are very patriotic but they are a dying breed - quite literally.
Speaking as a boomer we don't all just shrug our shoulders - many of us are truly horrified at what is happening and heartbroken at the state of the nation we are leaving to our grandchildren.
An incidental point on penmanship. My grandfather left school at 14 (in the 1930's), but had as beautiful, florid - yet perfectly legible - handwriting as you could wish to see. I suspect that was a common enough thing to encounter at one time.
Great stuff Woes - some of its themes crop up in the book The Fallout by Andrew Anthony who although from a younger generation than Harrison did the same move into the liberal middle-class - literally to the Guardian but ends up questioning atleast some of the Establishment's shibboleths as a result of 9/11. He recounts his mother being dismissed for racism by her MP Harriet Harman in Gordon Brown "bigoted woman" fashion when she had cause to raise some complaint with her.
"It is no longer the foreigner who is foreign on this English street, but the Englishman". That puts it so starkly and oddly reminds me of yet another book by a Guardian journalist - this (extraordinary) passage from it (All Together Now - Mike Carter) is literally the anti-thesis to this article where an Indian woman in Southall recounts triumphantly how they drove the "racists" out of Southall - ie ethnically cleansed the area to terraform it for the new replacement population before lamenting "England isn't England without white people" and complaining about Somalians. He was at least honest enough to report the conversation although I am sure has no intention of grasping the implications of the destructive lunacy of open borders globalism.
Thanks so much for returning to the work of Tony Harrison. After your last piece on his work, I felt I was a bit harsh on Harrison in the comment I left. I speculated on whether he was one of those boomers that doesn’t care as they’ll be dead by the time all hell is let loose. I agree with you - I think this poem shows that he does care about what happens to the white working class from whence he came. It’s an incredibly moving piece. Harrison did not sentimentalise the white working class either - his depiction of the wife beater next door was all too real.
Like you, I feel frustrated that he and others can’t take that final step and actually come out and say that mass immigration has been a disaster and a crime against all of us. He’s 87 years’ old now - what would it cost him to tell the truth?
‘And so the kingdom of Gondor sank into ruin, the line of kings failed, the white tree withered and the rule of Gondor was given over to lesser men.’ - JRR Tolkien
I'm glad you like this, LoS. There will be quite a few Harrison essays, maybe ten. It's an on-going series and half of them have been begun already. https://millennialwoes.substack.com/p/grim-rhymer
To answer your question... At his age, I think he can only be worried about his reputation/legacy.
That’s so good to read. I think it’s great you are discussing his work - poetry is too often overlooked. I always admired Harrison for refusing to sentimentalise the lives of the white working class. In the film-poem ‘Prometheus’ (1998) the statue of Prometheus has been made from the melting down of miners’ bodies, alluding to the horrific illness, if not death, that they suffered as a result of going down the pits. Sometimes it can be easy, from our current abysmal viewpoint, to idealise the past. I still remember ‘Prometheus’ being screened on Channel 4 in 1998, at peak viewing time - how far culture has fallen since then. This was a world before the horrors of reality tv of course….
I've never actually seen Prometheus, but it was a mini documentary about it in 1998 that first made me aware of TH. I will be watching the film finally soon, so as to write an essay about it.
I’ll be so interested to read that! ‘Prometheus’ is a very powerful piece. It’s set in a bleak post-industrial landscape that is very clearly Yorkshire after the miners’ strike of 1984. It’s full of classical allusions - I recall reading that Harrison was very influenced by Shelley’s poem ‘Prometheus Unbound’ also. I was at university in 1998 doing my doctorate; there was a good deal of academic excitement around this new work by Harrison, especially the fact that it was addressing the decline of the working class. Left wing academics were still concerned with such things back then Woes - these were the days before identity politics of course…and the miners’ strike was still relatively recent in the collective memory.
For the people who run the country immigration has been a success.
Looking at H’s career we can probably conclude that the common people made a fatal mistake in trusting the kind of people who become politicians.
Definitely. The predator class have done nicely out of it. Just one such example - Churchill’s grandson Rupert Soames, the CEO of the disgusting SERCO, an outsourcing company that basically does all the government’s dirty deeds for them. SERCO have been trying to buy up all available property for the housing of those that have come to replace the British. I had some dealings with them, when they offered to buy my old house in Yorkshire. They are the worst scumbags imaginable. Soames epitomises the predator class. He’s doing very nicely, thanks.
Sounds like Blackrock in America. And of course the Soames/Churchill family has form for selling out the country for personal Gold, as was (encouragingly) alluded to by the historian Daryll Cooper on the Tucker Carlson show recently. Is it just me or is it becoming slightly less verboten to mention the youknowwhos?
Definitely. The damage that SERCO has done, for instance, is incalculable. They have their grubby fingers in every pie. Once the decision was made by government to outsource what had once been seen as essential service, the door was opened for the wolves. Now these ghastly bean counters run everything and they have no love for us.
Yes. There are traitors without parliament, as well as within
This is such a powerful and haunting post.
It beautifully illustrates the deep melancholy that has overtaken so many Northern towns—fuelled by the slow, intentional erosion of the tightly woven social fabric that once defined working-class England.
What really strikes me is how it goes beyond just the demographic changes, delving into the widespread sense of tension and alienation experienced by those of us who feel their sense of belonging and identity is being erased—not merely by the presence of foreign nations, but by the broader socio-political forces that allowed this transformation to take root.
The post is a stark reminder of the emotional and psychological toll that such sociological upheavals have on the people who once formed the backbone of these communities.
The issue of elderly people being unable to move out or being 'left behind' isn’t discussed nearly enough. It’s a cold ‘thanks’ from the government to people who’ve likely worked their entire lives. I think this is part of why the 'right' is so intent on dismantling the image of Churchill. I'm not a fifth columnist, but the smoke and mirrors, Simpsons' monorail man platitudes about the UK have to end.
Here’s something I always keep in mind when talking about mortgages: You don’t just invest in a 'home'; you invest in a community and the surrounding area. That IS your home - don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. In the past, proximity to work, whether it was a 'good area,' and whether your kids got into a good school were the main concerns. Now it’s about, 'Will my street and neighborhood remain stable?' or 'Will I actually be surrounded by my own people?' These shouldn’t even be questions anyone has to ask - it was once a given. Surely, a government wouldn’t allow this because it doesn’t make sense? But here we are. If they can’t promise me that in 30 years I’ll still be living in more or less the same place, just with a few improvements, then they can get to fuck. I don’t care if you’re a doctor or a janitor, that should be a basic promise, and I don't see that promise being kept. In fact it's so simple a premise that you shouldn't even have to explain it further than financial reasons never mind anything else.
I was going to end this by saying that, as Scottish people, we like to tell ourselves, 'We’ll never get like that,' or 'we’re not England.' But honestly? Even the most apolitical people in my life are talking about this now. Blokes from my town, who in any other time would be the most boring people imaginable (writing letters about potholes to the local paper, the library opening times) are now talking about 'the West' as a whole. This should be funny in a small-town way because it's such a 180, but it's a sobering reality that women and kids (and even vulnerable adult males) are feeling unsafe walking into town because of these hotels, and via legal means has led to more unsafe and less tight-knit communities.
You’d think there’d be a sense of ‘people are waking up,’ but instead, it just makes me feel sick. You’ve been warning people about this publicly for, what, 10 years now? People in our towns and villages shouldn’t even have to think about these things. It shouldn’t have to be this way.
Also thanks Woes, your articles always conjure a lot of thoughts which is the best compliment I can give you.
A good friend of mine who’s originally from Leeds always tells me when he goes back he is always heart broken.
The area he grew up is now an immigrant area and he has been told on numerous occasions he is not welcome.
...'he has been told on numerous occasions he is not welcome.'
And here is where the rubber meets the road. It's at this point, when the immigrants force out the natives at knife point, that even the NPCs become aware what has happened--and that it's too late to do anything about it.
The only options remaining are, well, left unspoken, for the moment.
For the moment.
Yeah, but the food, Woes! The FOOD!
IROR!
Very interesting (as ever), your range as a writer is impressive.
There's a disturbing "calm before the storm" numbness in places like Leeds, most whites don't want to seem racist, and until recently the invasion was gradual enough to seem fairly trivial, so you'll find most whites just kind of ignore it, work around it, don't go into certain areas. It's as if you had a big garden and part of it became swampy, midge-ridden, you don't really know what to do so just avoid that part; unfortunately, that part is spreading rapidly and it has a beard and a machete.
A friend from Bradford told me there's a line of demarcation north of Bradford, towns like Shipley: everything south is Pakistani Muslim, everything north is white; as he put it, chuckling, "it's a line defined and held by hatred."
I've often noticed whites (especially older ones) are deeply uneasy about the invasion; they feel it in their bones, you might say - and yet they can be perfectly friendly to individual swarthoids. That's one of the weird and horrible things, that there are individual e.g. Hindus who are far better (nicer, more decent, more intelligent) than our homegrown chavs, but even if every single swarthoid were lovely the numbers make it an invasion, and invasions tend to end badly for one side.
The "numbness", as if whites are deadening their own sensitivity to what they're losing, is not going to last.
It's heart breaking to read this. It's happening all over the Western World. Hidden (mostly white) overlords are destroying the white middle class in Europe and America. Dumping 20,000 Haitians in mostly White Springfield Ohio, is just one example. These people are all being brought here to replace the native white citizens. The new comers are from Thugocracies and have no history nor experience of self-government. Both of the two neighborhoods I grew up on are not totally black ghettos with the houses so neglected and beaten down that the only way to move forward would be to flatten them with tractors.
Thanks for that Morgoth. My great grandfather and grandfather lived on Tempest Road. Number 88. I was brought up on the other side of Cross Flatts Park on the “Parkfields” I left in 1967 and never went back.
It's Woes, not Morgoth. ;)
It's amazing you know Tempest Road, and Cross Flatts Park. Tony Harrison did another poem, Shrapnel, which mentions both, and that prompted me to write a separate essay about the park. That will be published alongside the essay on Shrapnel, early next year. What, if anything, can you remember about the park?
I spent ages playing in there. My nursery was in the middle of the park, asbestos prefabs. There used to be large square stone blocks, which we used to try and reach when we were sledging. There was also some slides, swings and roundabouts. I went to Cross Flatts junior school. We used to have to march down the park to the kitchen, dining room, this was at the bottom of Tempest Road, Dewsbury Road. There was also a small tuck shop at the bottom of the park. My mate Norman Pilling used to get a tube of fruit pastilles from there every day. We sat next to each other, so marched down to dinner together. I used to try and scrounge some off him, he only ever let me have the Green ones.
Regards,
Bill Webster
Thanks for replying. The park had various things initially, that seem to have disappeared as it went downhill. There was a bandstand, an aviary, a greenhouse and a pavilion building, the Watsonian Pavilion. Do you remember any of those?
What was the "atmosphere" of the park at that time? Was it rough, dangerous, etc.? It definitely seems to have gone that way in the 80s and 90s.
And what were the demographics like?
I don’t remember any of those. It certainly wasn’t rough or dangerous. Though the demographics were very different,being entirely white working class. I remember that the streets were cobbled on the Parkfields. Tempest Road was considered quite posh and it was not unusual to be shood off. They seemed to know that you were not from there. Sorry I cannot remember more, memories fade. Looking forward to your next piece.
Sorry about that Millennial Woes. I look forward to your next essay.
Another fantastic piece, I am really enjoying this series.
Interesting article and I can fully appreciate that when a whole neighbourhood is over-run it must be very upsetting for the last elderly white resident.
However sometimes new non-white neighbours can be a blessing.
My parents lived most of their married life in South West London and saw huge and not very welcome changes.
After my father died my mother put the house on the market and eventually left London - which none of us had enjoyed living in - to move in with my sister in Plymouth.
During the period between my father's death and my mother selling up an evangelical West Indian Christian family moved in next door and proved an absolute Godsend for my mother.
Not only were they extremely house proud and enthusiastic gardeners but also took it upon themselves to watch over my mother.
Their eldest son would come round in the summer to mow her lawn and do any heavy lifting jobs for her.
They were always dropping off cakes and other home baked goods.
If they did not see her for a few days they would knock on the door just to make sure she was OK.
My mother was in her early 70s and rather shy so my sister and I - who no longer lived in London - were very relieved she had such kind and responsible neighbours.
The whole family were fully employed Church going Christians - law abiding with beautiful old-fashioned manners and values.
Sadly a significant number of immigrants are nothing like this family.
A great many West Indians are not remotely law abiding.
Christianity is the founding faith of these fair isles and Islam is entirely alien.
Many older generation West Indians are very patriotic but they are a dying breed - quite literally.
Speaking as a boomer we don't all just shrug our shoulders - many of us are truly horrified at what is happening and heartbroken at the state of the nation we are leaving to our grandchildren.
An incidental point on penmanship. My grandfather left school at 14 (in the 1930's), but had as beautiful, florid - yet perfectly legible - handwriting as you could wish to see. I suspect that was a common enough thing to encounter at one time.
Great stuff Woes - some of its themes crop up in the book The Fallout by Andrew Anthony who although from a younger generation than Harrison did the same move into the liberal middle-class - literally to the Guardian but ends up questioning atleast some of the Establishment's shibboleths as a result of 9/11. He recounts his mother being dismissed for racism by her MP Harriet Harman in Gordon Brown "bigoted woman" fashion when she had cause to raise some complaint with her.
"It is no longer the foreigner who is foreign on this English street, but the Englishman". That puts it so starkly and oddly reminds me of yet another book by a Guardian journalist - this (extraordinary) passage from it (All Together Now - Mike Carter) is literally the anti-thesis to this article where an Indian woman in Southall recounts triumphantly how they drove the "racists" out of Southall - ie ethnically cleansed the area to terraform it for the new replacement population before lamenting "England isn't England without white people" and complaining about Somalians. He was at least honest enough to report the conversation although I am sure has no intention of grasping the implications of the destructive lunacy of open borders globalism.
https://postimg.cc/hzGGqxmT