How I Left The National Grid: A Post-Punk Novel
- Submitting institution
-
University of Lincoln
- Unit of assessment
- 27 - English Language and Literature
- Output identifier
- 37715
- Type
- A - Authored book
- DOI
-
-
- Publisher
- John Hunt Publications
- ISBN
- 178279896X
- Open access status
- Out of scope for open access requirements
- Month of publication
- February
- Year of publication
- 2015
- URL
-
-
- Supplementary information
-
-
- Request cross-referral to
- -
- Output has been delayed by COVID-19
- No
- COVID-19 affected output statement
- -
- Forensic science
- No
- Criminology
- No
- Interdisciplinary
- No
- Number of additional authors
-
0
- Research group(s)
-
-
- Proposed double-weighted
- No
- Reserve for an output with double weighting
- Yes
- Additional information
- To research How I Left The National Grid - A Post-Punk Novel I initially listened to many post-punk records, met musicians from this scene, watched interviews with musicians and saw films with archive footage. For this book the setting was Manchester, so given the importance of Manchester’s creative milieu to the music created in the post-punk scene some time was spent there. I undertook inner city walks and became accustomed to relevant areas of the city. Manchester has undergone a series of architectural transformations over the last few decades, and these walks revealed different architectural layers of the city. Given that one of the initial aims of the novel was to historicize self-fashioning, this first-hand experience allowed me to appreciate the relevant creative milieu.
Through the research process of becoming familiar with Manchester I gained a sense of the many urban changes that have occurred in this city, which are evident in its clash of architectural styles. As the novel is narrated alternatively by a musician working in the eighties (Robert Wardner) and a journalist searching for him in 2004 (Sam) I was able to inflect the prose with this research, depicting the architectural changes in Manchester as noted by Robert in the first person, and through the point of view of Sam in the third person.
During the course of this research, I watched interviews with musicians such as Mark E. Smith and Richey Edwards, who were influential when conceiving Wardner. I realized that Wardner would have carried a ferocious, if cerebral, anger. His voice began to emerge strongly: succinct, brittle, passionate. In this respect the detailed research into Manchester singers like Smith, whose memoir was read, like him, became apparent in the novel.
- Author contribution statement
- -
- Non-English
- No
- English abstract
- -