The Offing (2019)

Why this one?

I’ve been meaning to read more of Myers’ work since enjoying Cuddy and Rare Singles last year.

Benjamin Myers (1976- ; active 2004-) was born in Durham, England. In his teens, he was a member of the local punk band Sour Face, and began writing for the weekly music paper Melody Maker. Alongside his journalism, he also published books on the likes of John Lydon, Green Day and The Clash. He published his first novel, The Book of Fuck, in 2004, but it was his second Richard: A Novel (2010) that brought wider attention. It was a fictionalized novel told from the perspective of the Manic Street Preachers member Richey Edwards, who went missing in 1995 and (in the absence of any evidence) was legally declared dead in 2008. It received some criticism (partly for its timing) from the surviving band members.

His third novel, 2012's Pig Iron, won the inaugural Gordon Burn Prize, and his fifth, The Gallows Pole (2017) won the Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction. The latter was adapted for the BBC by Shane Meadows (This is England) and aired in 2023. Cuddy (2023) won the Goldsmith’s Prize and is generally incredible. Alongside his literary novels he has also published crime fiction, short stories and poetry. The Offing (2019) is being adapted as a film by director Jessica Hobbs (Broadchurch, The Crown) starring Helena Bonham Carter. He is married to fellow author Adelle Stripe.

Thoughts, etc.

The Offing takes place one summer in the years after the Second World War, in North-East England. Robert Appleyard, a sixteen year old from a Durham mining town, has finished his compulsory education and before he begins his expected path in life, following his lineage of male relatives into a mining career, he sets off on a journey south along the North Sea coast, aiming only to see more of the world outside of his small town. After a period sleeping under the stars, completing manual labour for those he meets along the way to pay for food, he stumbles upon a dilapidated cottage in the vicinity of Robin Hood’s Bay inhabited only by the bohemian Dulcie Piper and her dog Butler.

Intending to move on after a day’s work once more, Robert is encouraged by Dulcie to stay for a prolonged period, which he initially resists but seems to keep finding himself pulled back to her cottage, enticed initially by her mysteriously lavish meals (in a time of near-universal austerity) and intriguing stories about her past. The magnetic pull of the cottage only increases when Robert discovers an unread book of poems addressed to Dulcie by a Romy Landau. As Robert learns about Romy’s history, her connection to Dulcie and her tragic fate, he also learns more about himself in a way that sets him on a path to transcending his seemingly predetermined life.

This is a really magical book on multiple levels. As with much of Myers’ writing, it has a firmly rooted sense of place, and impeccably evokes the atmosphere and landscape of the North East of England. In this one, nature also plays a particular role, with Robert’s seemingly naturally inherited knowledge of the minute categorisations of local flora and fauna making for some rich and captivating descriptions of the natural world around him. I’m not normally a huge fan of this kind of extended description in novels, but here it is both beautifully done and also functional in its evocation of Robert’s mindset - he’s both born of the land and able to transcend it by turning its vocabulary into a form of poetry.

Dulcie is absolutely one of the most enjoyable characters I’ve come across in a long time. She’s been around a bit, charming the great and the good of the literary and political worlds, is worldly wise and well-travelled, anwid has a seemingly endless supply of exotic foods that are barely known to Robert, let alone widely available in the era of rationing. At times she seems to find Robert’s naivete amusing, and mocks him in a likeable sort of way, but she also clearly notices some potential in him that she seems to want to nurture. We initially don’t quite know how someone with her rich history has wound up in a knock-down cottage on the rugged northern coastline, and that adds further to her intrigue as a character.

As well as place, the time evoked in The Offing is hugely important. Its post-war setting, and Robert’s initial embodiment of all the cliches of a ‘lad from a mining town’ of that period, is a perfect background, all shades of grey, against which a colourful character like Dulcie can enter, both disrupting and shining light on everything she touches. It’s not just her exotic provisions that shock Robert. Dulcie also introduces him to a truly shocking worldview, certainly not one encountered in his life to date: the idea that not everything from Germany is inherently evil. Over time, we learn some of the reasons for Dulcie’s embrace of all things Teutonic, but most importantly her cosmopolitan worldview is eye-opening to Robert and the start of his journey towards looking at everything from a different angle; a prerequisite for poetic expression.

There are aspects of the story that aren’t especially new, and in fact it sits fairly comfortably in the Bildungsroman tradition, or the ‘working class kid done good’ narrative, in other words. But the joy here is not in the novelty of the tale, but the execution of the telling. Many books in that tradition may involve a mentor figure, but Dulcie is a particularly unique example - far from directing Robert’s future, she’s much more of a gentle instigator, expanding Robert’s worldview and planting seeds that take time to blossom. The introduction of the Dulcie/Romy tragic, poetic backstory only adds to this, layering in something that’s entirely other to Robert’s previous conception of the world.

Score

9

Another great read from one of my favourite authors. I’m sure I’ll be ticking off the rest of his books slowly over the next few years!

Next up

More belated reads from by TBR pile.