One Hoondred Books of Solitude: Non-fiction: Belgo Geordie's finest companions and deep head scratchers

As sun sets on the balding dome of a life well spent between covers of many books, I wondered what were the tomes that were the most important ter me and thems tha lasted distance. That I could read today and still think not bad, even allreet! Be moved/improved/stunned or gobsmacked by the sheer intelligence of someone with a pen and summat ter say. And like when yon bible were poot out in plain English, I were privileged to live through a time when books were cheap as chips, plentiful and it were no disgrace ter bury yer nose inta summat, muttering ter self and feeling light bulbs illuminate the darkness of why life were so blurry difficult ter get ter bottom of owt when it looked simple like! This is fer non-fiction and I've tried ter keep ter chronology. Like when I read summat first and banged a tent peg inta ground as a marker of summat learned or gained. So let oos start with first fifteen like. Aye, I were fourteen when....

Seize the Time - The Story of the Black Panther Party. Bobby Seale (1968): If ever a book highlighted the injoostice at core of American dream it were this un. For someun black to exercise the same rights as white folk in America, even in the urban 'liberal' cities were downright dangerous in 1960's (and still today - Black Lives Matter). Yet Mr Seale provides a blueprint for social justice an equality. Practical ways to tackle poverty, illiteracy and give back pride. Boot this manifesto is aboot courage an the universal right ter autonomy fer all folk- not joost the elite. The adult literacy programs, accessible legal-aid, pre-school breakfast programs fer bairns. Still relevant? Aye,  it were an attempt to liberate through reasoned argument and I were persuaded and remain so today. It were also the story of Huey Newton and the role of prisons, inhumane but universities of consciousness, black and brown militancy; raising and forging political ideals to break the cycles of droogs, violence and incarceration. Summat too powerful fer main stream American politics ter swallow. Add anything on the trial of Chicago Seven, where Mr Seale were placed in shackles and then gagged for daring to ask fer his right ter be heard. And then Angela Davis.

The Diary of Anne Frank (1955): Me da made us read it. He thought I whined too much and had it too easy. He had lived under Nazi occupation from age of 14; Anne were 13. Amsterdam were not mooch different from Ghent, his home town, and we had a Jewish uncle the family hid. This book were also on school reading list. I thought Ms Frank were a bit of posh and girly swot ter begin with and what were so hard living inside yer hoose fer two years and not going ter school? Boot by end me hairs were oop on back of me neck. It were the ordinariness of the people living in fear and jumping at shadows and the constant threat of betrayal or making a mistake. Having to oonderstand not all Dutch folk were yer friends; some folk are joost bad, selfish and greedy. And at end of a train line - the evil of the nazi murder factories; the camps. Anne and family first sent ter Auschwitz. Then in March 1945 she and her sister Margot were transported to Bergen Belsen and were killed by typhus. In truth she and her sister were murdered for no better reason than being Jewish girls. An for yon apologists, creating conditions where folk were starved, brutalised and left ter die of typhus is murder. Aye, reading holocaust literature is a good way ter understand that if yer don't take a stand then all that is ugly aboot the human heart can rise oop and flood the world with cruelty, pain, grief and misery. And today it is still all too common, fed by nationalism, bigotry and fascism in all its guises including fundamentalism. Two years ago, Mrs Belgo Geordie and I visited the house in Amsterdam. It were claustrophobic. Queues to get in stretched out alongside a church. What does that say? The power through her words, from a young un just starting on life, lives on. What would she have become? And all of those wee girls and boys...

My Family and Other Animals - Gerald Durrell (1956): Aye, this was when I wore knee high ter a minnow. Me I wanted ter be yon Gerry on a Greek Island. Living under constant sun in brilliant light surrounded by clear watta chasing animals an' not go ter school. Like yon Gerry I would study caterpillars, furry bear things that turned into moths and think aboot the greater meaning of it all. Boot this were read to us at little uns school by loves own dream. Afternoons where snow, sleet, rain and darkness reigned outside. It opened oop an inner world of light, warmth and laughter. Me family were deranged boot his were not far from that. I lived in mythical Corfu not knowing it were long gone in time. It taught me that there were folk in England who broke free of class. Who found colonising were not much use to getting ter know the world at large. And it has stood me well. I like folk and the differences that make is, well weird and barmy.  Although a novel, it is more autobiography what I include it here. It is laugh out loud funny. Aye and this were the Durrell with more grey matter than Lawrence. Another lesson in life, yer don't have to shout from the trees to be brilliant. Gerald, I thank you for wrestling me free of the strait jacket that was England in the 1960s and giving me the gift of imagination. By heck I needed it!.

Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee - An Indian history of the American West. Dee Brown (1970): Aye Geronimo, Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull - all names form Saturday morning pictures and epics like Custer's last stand. We were oop fer the goings on in the badlands of cowboys and injuns in the woods surrounding orphanage in West Denton. Then there were poems, the noble savage. Stories of brave trappers in the wilds of North America. Boot nowt prepares you for reading a stark history of colonial oppression, land theft, and genocide exercised on people of ter land. Dee Brown provides the history between 1860 and 1890 where the civilisation of the American Indian, tribe by tribe were systematically destroyed by settlers, the European Americans. Nowt honourable aboot US calvary. This, then, is the other side of the "Wild West" myth; the voices and history of the Indians captured. Betrayed, massacred boot full of courage. Taking stand after stand against the odds and still hoping for a better world, where they as first people, would be honoured and respected. I wept reading this as a sixteen year old and still do, knowing now the stories of Maori and the first people of Australia. Aye and on it goes in America today, the depth of wounds of their first people boot still drawing breath to protest against exploitation of the small lands they still hold.

If yer ever need a hero Sitting Bull'll do me

The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich. William L Shirer (1959): Me dad had experienced the nazis fist hand oonder occupation and despised fascism in any form. This written by an American 'foreign correspondent' who lived through part of the 12 year Reich were an eye opener as social history forged through being there rather than the staid history we were taught. Me gettin' inta a fight with a teacher who said not all nazis were bad and Jews had it coming. This were first book on Germany that spelled out those who signed oop ter be brown shirts or party members knew exactly what they were about and yon Hitler worship were summat we should always reflect on and continue ter do so now. This is a portrait of colossal evil being set free to wreak destruction through political process and showed them that sat back and let it happen shoulda ha hung their heads in shame. And fer all the fine talk aboot being afraid ter stand oop and be counted, too many folk sat on the fence when it were still possible to prevent a fascist dictatorship and not joost in Germany. Although there are books with more historical knowledge, the rawness of being there and reporting on the daily sink inta a country both seduced and strangled by an nationalist ideology based on hate, destruction of the other. And pushin a barra of entitlement of being a master race still has summat ter say in the world today.

Homage to Catalonia: George Orwell (1938): Dead canny that Orwell. Owt he wrote is worth a gander! "Boos Ticket." by George Orwell - blurry work of genius man! The powerful English essayist and political writer. Aye and novels. There's nowt mooch he wrote that is not worth a lick of the pencil ter read for either ideas or the pure enjoyment of language. This is a tragic analysis of a civil war of liberation being turned oopside down resulting in a triumph of fascism. Me marrer Werner Droescher who saw Barcelona oonder a brief anarchist spring where the people ran the city boot that were undermined in the durty war of Stalin's totalitarian communism betraying the anarchists and the socialist left. And sadly the left's own love of factionalism kicking seven shades outta the International Brigade's idealism and vision. Setting oop big brother fascism that would tear Europe and large parts of the world apart in the coming decade. In Spain under the tyranny of Franco and the church the rights and lives of workers were crushed under boot of poverty. It took Franco ter draw his last breath for change ter come. Aye, add Down and Out in Paris and London and The Road to Wigan Pier and all the essays and articles Mr Orwell is and remains the real thing- and a reading pleasure.


Playpower: Richard Neville (1970): More than wanting ter be a hippie, it were the clarion call to a counter culture, a breaking of shackles and more taboos than a nun could point a stick at. We wanted desperately ter put space between oos an our parents generation. It were as Mr Neville wrote: "Praise Marx and pass the stereo headphones!" Music and revolution! It were canny! The short boot interesting life of "Oz" and the underground press. Aye, I can remember being right scandalised about the size of Roopert Bear's tool! It shattered the thin eggshell of English reserve and allowed me ter cast off me kit and hang out on remote beaches of New Zealand with nowt on boot a hankie around me neck (red). It were grand! Sun burn an salt sting and all. Aye fer some of us this book were our coming of age manifesto. We were selfish chits mind! An' sadly tha rebellion collapsed under droogs and an insipid lazy anarchy of self fulfilment. Marx turned inta waiting for the man, getting laid or waiting fer summat ter happen. I joined People's Union and cut me hair.



The Wretched of the Earth: Frantz Fanon (1967-Penguin): I were fifteen when I left school. Not a grand education boot I loved big ideas and thinking and thinking hard were not summat that came easy to oos. Others had the tools ter make sense of political ideology. Boot I read like a combined harvester going through wheat field, choking on the chaff. Boot once in awhile Id read summat that would sit me on me bum. This were one of those books yer had to read but were never going to fully understand. A clarion call on imperialism and colonisation through the lens of the Algerian revolution. It were not an easy read, or comfortable subject matter. A psychiatrist in 1960s Algeria, his observations and reflections still hold true. Aye, in these regions the destruction of secular politics were fertile ground fer extreme religious ideology ter prosper. Died too young boot the power of his thinking still holds true in Arab spring and roots of Europe's colonial past now its future.



Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas - A Strange Journey to the Heart of the American Dream. Hunter S. Thompson (1971): Come the hour and here's the man. That insanity that were American politics in the era of Richard Nixon required a journalist to tell the truth as it were; truly insane and through a haze of droogs so thick it would stoon an army of angry bull rhinos wanting ter batter doon the Berlin Wall. This was gonzo journalism and led to books on presidential campaign trails where the weirder just kept being elected and the good doctor a witness and scribe of events too strange to make up. Yer have ter read Mr Thompson as film and biographies never captured the spirit of the deranged anarchist who could write like John Coltrane blew. So many notes pouring over you like angry bees. Add Dan O Neill "The Odd Bodkins" a cartoon series of anarchy, philosophy and joost at times plain strange. Henry Miller "The Air Conditioned Nightmare" and "Colossus of Rhodes". Miller were a good writer boot recently rereading "Collossus" I were reminded fer all his anarchism, he were a snob and self obsessed ter point of turning good prose dull. Nowt ended oop on cutting floor, and not all he had ter say were mooch at all. "Air Conditioned Nightmare" is summat else. A critique of America, consumerism and a rising empire of parochialism, arrogance and the brutality of class division oonder capitalism.

The good doctor on a journalistic mission

A Fortunate Man - The Story of a Country Doctor: John Berger and Jean Mohr (1967): Set in Forest of Dean. Political photo journalism and recording of idealism in general practice - where community, doctor and seasons merge. It is and remains inspiring with John Berger's sharp analysis supported by the almost pastoral photography of Jean Mohr. Almost, as it captures country life of people struggling to make a living and existing in a time where work was eroding and poverty constant. Life, death and big personalities. Boot also John Berger's big brain digging inta meaning of the ordinary, giving dignity ter poverty that is no choice boot an imposition of circumstance and too often, birth. Mr Berger makes oos think and see oother perspectives. Critical thinking one o one where he leaves yer ter join oop dots. When I can, I give this book ter new minted doctors...summat about doctoring as a challenge, every day life and a vocation. Mr Berger, I am grateful that I read through the many books you put out, It took one Christopher Hitchens to bend the elastic of me brain...

Look at how cheap as chips books were!!

Goodbye to all That - Robert Graves (1929 - revised in 1959): I still remember awld men shuffling aboot me childhood who had been through First War. Broken spirits, often heavy drinkers and handy with their fists. Boot there were them who were quiet. So closed down as to be like a wall of granite. Them didn't talk about trenches and one's that did were still angry. Angry at oos, the soft generation that had it too good. Angry at folk who liked her think there were summat noble in that war. At school we read Erich Remarque's "All Quiet on the Western Front". And were stunned by the arbitrariness of death at end when we all knew war were going ter end by November 1918. See, soldiers caught up in it new nowt other than to survive, get on with it and try not too think too much in case yer were pulled down inta an emotional mud as thick as the physical one of the pockmarked and churned oop battlefields. It were me dad who pointed out not many of the old soldiers went ter the big public remembrance day ceremonies, or if they did it were ter honour marras not glorify war. Mr Graves, a fine poet also, tells it as it is. Read and weep.



Soledad Brother The Prison Letters of George Jackson (1971):  When I picked this oop in February 1972, it were a more troubling read than Seize the Time (Bobby Seale). Boot oonderstand, he were a man as a youth sentenced ter one year ter life having driven the getaway car in a robbery on a petrol station where seventy dollars were stolen. Nad chance of parole. His letters describe the brutality and racism within the prison system. Protest aboot sooch conditions and yer were American prison system dog tucker. George Jackson. like Huey Newton was radicalised and used his anger and incarceration ter educate hisself and organise. Increasingly, like Black Panthers, he used violence as a way ter stand oop ter institutional racism and violence and became a political militant.  It were never going ter end well and yer are left admiring the bravery of a man who fought back but were crushed by relentless odds. There were niver going ter be joostice fer George Jackson, it ended him being shot dead after taking hostages at Soledad prison. The letters reflect the hopes and dreams of a young man. A yearning fer a better life than were his lot. And he could write ter folk, including Angela Davis, and describe what that were amongst the maelstrom of a racial war. It still burns brightly.

The Female Eunuch Germaine Greer: (1970): 

In a foreword added to the 21st anniversary edition, Greer references the loss of women's freedom with the "sudden death of communism" (1989) as catapult for women the world over for a sudden transition into consumer Western society wherein there is little to no protection for mothers and the disabled; here, there is no freedom to speak:

"The freedom I pleaded for twenty years ago was freedom to be a person, with dignity, integrity, nobility, passion, pride that constitute personhood. Freedom to run, shout, talk loudly and sit with your knees apart. Freedom to know and love the earth and all that swims, lies, and crawls upon it...most of the women in the world are still afraid, still hungry, still mute and loaded by religion with all kinds of fetters, masked, muzzled, mutilated and beaten."

And yer have ter ask how mooch has changed? Like Angela Dworkin, Germaine Greer is heavy meat ter sup on boot in this book she nailed it and is allus worth a listen. Agree or not she has never taken a step back.

Philosophy 101 text book