Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} Up the Junction by UP THE JUNCTION (1967) From the collection of short stories 'Up the Junction' by Nell Dunn published in 1963. Nell Dunn was an upper-class woman who went 'slumming' in in 1959 and wrote a series of sketches (sketches being a much more appropriate term than short stories) which were published in 1963 (my copy has the cover on the left above) as 'Up the Junction'. Four of the pieces were published in The New Statesman. The stories mainly revolve around three working-class women, sisters Sylvie and Rube and an unnamed narrator. The first story, 'Out with the Girls', begins: We stand, the three of us, me, Sylvie and Rube, pressed up against the saloon door, brown ales clutched in our hands. Rube, neck stiff so as not to shake her beehive, stares sultrily round the packed pub. Sylvie eyes the boy hunched over the mike and shifts her gaze down to her breasts snug in her new pink jumper. 'Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!' he screams. Three blokes beckon us over to their table. Rube doubles up with laughter. 'Come on, then. They can buy us some beer.' 'Hey, look out, yer steppin' on me winkle!' Dignified, the three of us squeeze between tables and sit ourselves, knees tight together, daintily on the chairs. 'Three browns, please,' says Sylvie before we've been asked. The first version of 'Up the Junction' was of course and Tony Garnett's filming of the book for the strand in 1965, with as Sylvie, Geraldine Sherman as Rube and Vickery Turner as Eileen, presumably the unnamed narrator of the book. Loach directs it in typical cine-verite style, almost like a documentary, with much of the dialogue lifted straight from the book (the book is really just a series of snatched conversations, presumably overheard and noted by Dunn over the 3-4 years she lived in Battersea, so it lends itself very well to this kind of filming). There are only really three key incidents or situations in the book which are faithfully recorded by Loach in the TV version; the infamous abortion scene, Terry's death in a motorbike accident, and Dave (Tony Selby) going to prison for four years. The first two are retained in the film version, but there is no Dave in the film, although there is a similar ending. The film came out a couple of years later, in 1967, directed by Peter Collinson (who went on to direct The Italian Job ) but the cast has been completely changed, and noticeably the script is by Roger Smith (no idea of his antecedents), not Dunn herself. The whole style of the film has changed totally, including the music, with a new song written and performed by Manfred Mann just for the film: Suzy Kendall plays Polly, an upper class girl from Chelsea who deliberately sets out (much like Nell Dunn?) to live amongst the impoverished working-class in Battersea, as seen at the start of the scene above. In this respect she replaces the silent narrator of the book (and Eileen in the TV play) and thereby brings a new element, as in the book the narrator is clearly from the same background as those she observes. Polly gets a job at the factory where she meets Sylvie and Rube (now played by Maureen Lipman and Adrienne Posta respectively) and immediately settles in to her new life (I have always thought this very unlikely; would rough women in a factory really readily accept a posh girl turning up to work there, without being suspicious of her motives?) The introduction of a new character,Peter (played, in pre-Sweeney days, by Dennis Waterman), who becomes Polly's boyfriend, radically alters the viewpoint of the film compared to the book, as we now have someone who takes a critical stance on the world of Sylvie and Rube, unlike Polly who seems to be a complete in nocent abroad. They meet when Polly is looking for furniture for her new flat, but it soon becomes clear that whilst he wants to treat her to the high life, she wants nothing more than to get away from it all and experience the raw street life of Battersea, as when she persuades Peter that all she wants to do on Saturday night is just walk around: The book was praised for its lack of moralising over the sometimes shocking (at the time) lifestyle of its protagonists, as for example when Sylive runs into her ex-husband in the street one night: Now the stars are out as we turn into Reform Street. A crowd of them tumble out of the bright doorway of a house and among them is Ted and he sees Sylvie and he stands cocky and arrogant among his friends. 'Where d'you think you're going all dressed up like the Queen of Sheba?' 'What's that to you - you fifth-rate ponce?' They face each other in the gentle air. Everyone is quiet and Ted staggers and quivers with drink and rage. 'You ferkin' whore, I know you had that abortion round the corner for ten quid, I can prove it!' Sylvie goes for him. He hits her, she screams in anger and someone tries to pull her back. He hits her again and she falls down. 'You ferkin' brute and you don't give nothin' to your son!' 'I give him two shirts!' [Sylvie and Rube's mother turns up, as do the police] Down the hill glides a police car and the crowd melts into the shadows. Four men jump out. 'It was nothing, Inspector. Come on, we're just on our way home!' 'What are you doing in yer night-dress, Mother?' The Inspector grins after us as we troop up the warm road. Sylvie pushes her blonde hair back behind her ear. 'Keep never minding, it's only fer life.' This scene is played very faithfully in the TV version, and it reappears in the film, but the difference now is that we view it not only through Polly's eyes, but also through Peter's, with his contemptuous "Seen enough?": The abortion scene is retained, as one might expect; in the book this chapter is called 'Bang on the Common' (not what you think, it refers to the location of the house where Winny, the abortionist lives): Winny was about forty-five. She wore a red dress above her knees showing her varicose-vein legs, ankle socks and gym shoes. She had delicate arms and huge bony hands with long red fingers which she waved around. 'Well, what have we here, Annie?' 'I've come, I've come. ' said Rube, nervous. 'I know why you've come - there's only one reason good-looking girls come to see Winny. Here, Annie, pop across the off-licence and get me a quarter-bottle whiskey.' She gave her a ten-shilling note and Rube and I were left along with Winny. 'How far are you gone, love?' 'About three months.' Winny poked Rube in the stomach. 'Oh, then you've only got a small problem in there.' 'You see I can't keep it. ' Rube began. 'Don't try and explain, love. How can you ever explain anything? It's the most bloody impossible thing in the world. How much money have you got?' 'Give it over. You don't look more then seventeen.' 'I'm eighteen next month' 'Come on upstairs, then your friend can wait for you down here.' In the film Winny is played by Hylda Baker with grotesque relish, reprising her role in Saturday Night and Sunday Morning: The book's focus on the trial and imprisonment of Dave, the narrator's boyfriend, is replaced in the film at the end by Peter stealing a car to take Polly away for the weekend, a rather unsatisfactory end but there is no doubt that the film makers had a problem in resolving the narrative, as the book (and TV play) doesn't 'end' as such, the penultimate chapter ends: Evening and the girls wear cotton dresses showing teenage knees and loll against the off-licences eating fish and chips as we go by. The dogs snuff the dehoused rats in the latest demolished terraces. He [Barny, the Tally Man] drops me off. On the corner a group of jean-boys are gathered round bicycles and scooters hoisting Coca-Cola bottles to their lips, and all the chimneys of Battersea are reaching to the sky and puffing mauve clouds into the cloudless summer evening. You can buy the DVD of Up the Junction pretty cheaply - about £5 or so now - and I got my 1966 copy of the book from abebooks.co.uk, where it can be bought for less than £3 including p&p; it's only just over 100 pages long, but the problem I found with it was that it was difficult to work out the different characters, and the fact that most of it is dialogue means that it reads at times like a film script, which is probably why the TV play version is so successful at bringing Dunn's world to life. The TV version is availabe on a BBC box set called 'Ken Loach at the BBC' for less than £20, and it also has famous works such as '', '', '' as well as lesser known TV plays like 'Three Clear Sundays' which are usually pretty good, so well worth checking out. Up The Junction author on muses who inspired her works – 'It was a different culture' When you subscribe we will use the information you provide to send you these newsletters. Sometimes they'll include recommendations for other related newsletters or services we offer. Our Privacy Notice explains more about how we use your data, and your rights. You can unsubscribe at any time. In doing so, this champion of female ​sexual freedom gave an unforgettable voice to the women of the slums of south with her short story collection, Up The Junction, and made a lifetime’s worth of friends in the process. We are talking today about her new ​memoir, The Muse, which takes up the story of one of those friendships. “As in many families, sex wasn’t talked about when I was growing up,” Nell says, with glorious understatement. “That’s why I found it so amazing in Battersea. There was such talk of sex, and people were very witty about sex. It was a different culture entirely.” Related articles. Indeed it was, but to understand just how far from her own privileged background Nell strayed to discover the earthy stories that became hallmarks of her writing, you need to know a little more about her family. Her maternal grandfather was the 5th Earl of Rosslyn – the man who broke the bank at Monte Carlo – making her a direct ​descendant of Charles II and Nell Gwyn. Even if she was not officially royal, pure blue blood ran in her veins. Her father Sir Philip Dunn was a hugely rich baronet and her elder sister Serena married the peer and investment banker Jacob Rothschild. Cecil Beaton took her photograph and artists Lucian Freud and Francis Bacon were friends. Yet in 1959, Nell turned her back on the upper classes and her home in super-smart Chelsea and, together with her Eton-educated writer husband, , headed south across the river to Battersea. There they bought a little cottage in a busy street and Nell started to make friends among the locals. As a seriously posh girl, this made her a genuine outlier at a time when London was far from the gentrified fusion it is today. “I just wasn’t interested in Chelsea,” Nell, now 84, says. “I found it all boring, actually. People didn’t relate to you or talk to you.” Josie, left, and Nell on Common in the seventies (Image: Getty) Not so in the working class enclave of Battersea where she was in her element. In possession of the only telephone and bathtub in the road, her home was soon full of chatty neighbours. She found herself beguiled by their colloquial dialogue and started writing down the best bits. Some were gleaned from the local sweet factory where she took a job packing liqueur chocolates. “I think my greatest talent is overhearing other people’s conversations,” says Nell wistfully. “I think I hear everything that other people don’t hear. I’m really very nosy; terrifically nosy about language.” Her first book, Up The Junction, a prize-winning collection of short ​stories inspired by the struggles of working class women, came out in 1963 to huge acclaim. In the same year, her husband’s seminal play about homelessness, Cathy Come Home, was published. A controversial and harrowing backstreet abortion scene in Nell’s book caused a furore, but it did help shove the issue under the noses of parliamentarians, and helped lead to the groundbreaking Abortion Act. “I was just saying what was all around me – everyone knew,” she explains. A feature film version of Up The Junction was released in 1968. Her first novel, , published in 1967, was a bestseller and praised for its funny and frank account of ​women’s sexuality. In 1967, it was made into a film directed by Ken Loach and starring and Carol White. Dunn’s play Steaming was produced in 1981 and, four years later, was made into a film starring Vanessa Redgrave and Diana Dors. These two later works were inspired by the life of her muse – the subject of her new memoir, a woman whom she calls Josie – who now lives in Bognor Regis, West Sussex. Terence Stamp and Carol White in Poor Cow (Image: Getty) Josie was a working class girl from the estate in south-west London who married at 16. Nell was attracted by her colourful turn of phrase. Fifty years on, they are still friends and talk every day on the phone. “I was drawn to her because she was a very delightful human being and I was also interested in her lifestyle, not worrying too much about tomorrow but living in the day,” explains Nell. “I was terribly impressed she could run a bar but I think it was her use of language that particularly attracted me. “It conjures up, very vividly, a way of life and a way of thought – that ability to be very present. You are never lonely with her and she knows the answer to everything in life. If you said you had a sore toe, she would have a remedy for it.” Josie encouraged Nell to write the book, which quotes extensively from the letters she wrote Nell during various love affairs and features all her original spellings. “She read The Muse in one day and loved it,” says Nell, who now lives in Fulham, close to her Chelsea roots and her adopted home of Battersea. “I did ask if we should take out the bit about her having beautiful t**s. But she wanted me to leave it in. Most people don’t have that kind of confidence. “A friend was reading The Muse and he said, ‘I don’t warm to her very much’ but I didn’t in the least mind. She is very narcissistic, but why not be? Why not be interested in yourself?” It’s a comment reminiscent of the one Nell made on live television when Poor Cow was published and she spoke out about women’s right to greater sexual freedom. “The presenter said something like, ‘Don’t you think you’re encouraging promiscuity?’ “I said, ‘I hope I am. It’s good to try out a few people before you marry’. The pompous idiot was very taken aback.” Up The Junction featured Maureen Lipman, Suzy Kendall and Adrienne Posta (Image: Getty) She says she and Josie talk in the most ordinary way during their daily phone calls – “Like, ‘What are you having for supper?’ The Muse is about friendship and about how you learn to love someone you see so much. “She is not that interested in me, although she did meet my mother and father when they were alive, so she wasn’t just in a corner of my life; she was in all my life,” says Nell. “She liked my mother particularly and was never daunted. She was quite natural and easy with them. Josie has the ability to take away my anxiety and I could take away hers. To a certain extent that is what friendship is about. You make each other feel better for a moment. “I used to walk every day in Richmond Park and say ‘Hi’ to people. One day a woman was in floods of tears. She said she had shared an office for 30 years with a woman who had just retired. “It gave me food for thought about how being with someone a lot leads to loving them because you are such good friends. It’s not a passionate or sexual love; it’s somebody being there for you and to whom you can talk every day.” N ell has never shared an office with anyone – the sweet factory job was short-lived and writing tends to be a solitary profession – and she wonders aloud if she would have liked it. We both agree that open-plan offices can be a challenge for introverts but that proximity does lead to real friendship. She finds writing very hard and always has. “It becomes my whole world, every moment of my day and night is spent thinking about it and trying to get it right. I find it quite tiring. Looking back, I feel envious of people who’ve had colleagues.” She tells how while writing Steaming she would clip snippets of dialogue to a washing line. “I’d use a clothes peg and hang up things my characters would say. I would also make collages. I do capture and collect the things I hear. In that way I’m a scrap merchant.” She describes herself as a “natural feminist” and says it never occurred to her that she shouldn’t lead her own life. She only learnt to read at nine years old and has said that whenever her father saw her appalling spelling, he would laugh. “But it wasn’t an unkind laugh. In his laugh there was the message, ‘You are a completely ​original person, and everything you do has your own mark on it.’” Sometimes, she worries that her desire to live life on her own terms got in the way of love. “I think I was too passionate a feminist looking back. I worry that I didn’t support Dan [her late partner of three decades] over a difficult time in his work life. “I regret not downing tools and supporting my fellow, not that he asked for it. “I was in the middle of a book and can remember disregarding him. So fragile is my link when I’m writing something that it can easily fall to bits. “Josie wouldn’t have done that. She would have supported her man.” Reading books, Reading stories, Reading Life. Boy, that does sound odd. I see it's a VMC, which is reason enough for me to read the book, but your review's gotten me curious about it. I do wonder though, how I'd deal with blurred characters. Normally, I like each character to have a strong voice and traits, which define them. Yes, so do I. Somehow it just seems to work here. As far as I'm aware, it's the first VMC Ive read, but it's got me interested, and undoubtedly won't be the last. I remember reading the book when it was first published. It was a mild scandal then - a well-educated girl from a good family living in BATTERSEA and writing about such stuff. Nell Dunn was a talented person - she, I believe, also was involved with 'Cathy come home', the BBC Play that caused an even greater scandal that dealt with the HOUSING, or rather lack of HOUSING in post-war Britain AND the horrors it brought people a little down on their luck. As a child, we were almost homeless and found it very very hard to find somewhere to live. The film was made by Ken Loach, her husband, still, I believe. Up the Junction was filmed with the same woman that played Cathy - Carole something, I forget - it also starred Terrance Stamp in his 'matinee idol' days - I remember him singing COLOURS, the Donovan song. They made a sequel of the film about thirty years later here in the US called THE LIMEY - it was actually very good and had a great 'twist' that I never saw coming. I was a Clapham Junction for the first time in about 40 years recently and although it has changed, it is still remarkably the same. The children's children of the girls in Up the Junction were wandering the streets with kids in tow and moaning about their lot in life. Obviously the circle was NOT broken! After a little research, I realise that I have confused Neil Dunn's Up the Junction with her Poor Cow story - however, I never really saw a great difference between the two tales. The sequel film was to Poor Cow - sorry about this - put it down to my having a 'senior moment'. Both Poor Cow and Up the Junction are worthy of reading and seeing their films. I also recommend 'Steaming', which I saw in New York on Broadway, where it was NOT well received . and . best of all Cathy Come Home. Thanks to Tim Roth, this BBC-TV play was shown on Turner Classic Movies a few years back when he was guest 'chooser of the films' - poor Robert Osborne was visibly upset by the play . as we all were! Review: Up The Junction movie (1968) The always-excellent Talking Pictures TV is doing us all proud this weekend with a rare screening of the classic Up The Junction movie . Up The Junction (1968) Rare because it doesn’t often show on TV. It used to float around the satellite channels some years back. There was also a DVD release around 2008 which you can still pick up, although it is officially out of print. A Blu-ray too, but that goes for silly money. So all in all, a screening from Talking Pictures TV is very welcome. Up The Junction (1968) As you probably know, Up The Junction is based on a 1963 book by Nell Dunn, which was later made into a TV play courtesy of Ken Loach. A controversial one too back in the day. The big-screen version smoothed over some of the rough edges of the TV play and although still controversial and ‘gritty’ in parts, this is an altogether more glossy affair. Up The Junction (1968) Directed by Peter Collinson (who not long after directed The Italian Job), Up The Junction stars the wonderful Suzy Kendall, with lover interest Dennis Waterman in all his Mod glory plus support from the likes of Adrienne Posta, Maureen Lipman, Liz Fraser and Hylda Baker. A fantastic cast. A soundtrack by Manfred Mann too. I’m not a huge fan, but I like what they did with this. Up The Junction (1968) The storyline is pretty straightforward, albeit with a few detours. An affluent heiress known as Polly Dean (and played by Suzy Kendall) decides she is tired of her privileged life and wants to live with common people (I know), moving to Battersea top spend time with the working-class community there, picking up a job in a confectionery factory to pay the bills. Up The Junction (1968) She soon makes friends with sisters, Sylvie (Maureen Lipman) and Rube (Adrienne Posta) and all seems to be going well. But it wouldn’t be much of a film if that was the case. Rube has the double whammy of an unwanted pregnancy (leading to a backstreet abortion) and the death of boyfriend Terry (Michael Gothard). Up The Junction (1968) Polly meanwhile gets a love interest in the form of Mod Pete (played by British TV icon Dennis Waterman) but both have different ideas about the future. One wants to be rich, the other likes the idea of being poor. In the end, Pete’s chase for wealth brings it all to a sudden halt. Up The Junction (1968) Some amazing period footage, Waterman looks pretty sharp on his scooter and in his submariner jumper and Suzy Kendall is as wonderful as she always is. All with a decent little soundtrack to keep things ticking along. With it being harder to buy all the time (although you can ‘rent’ or download the film on Amazon Prime) a showing on Talking Pictures TV is welcome, especially with so many of us being stuck in and looking for a bit of a distraction. Don’t miss it. Up The Junction is screening on Talking Pictures TV on 25th April 2020 at 9:30pm. It’s likely to be repeated in the coming weeks too. Up The Junction by Nell Dunn. Also, if you want to go back to the source, the original 1963 book of Up The Junction by Nell Dunn is still in print and currently with a rather cool Adrienne Posta cover. You can get the paperback for around £8, with the Kindle version at half that price. Up the Junction by Dunn Nell. Paperback. Condition: Good. Connecting readers with great books since 1972. Used books may not include companion materials, some shelf wear, may contain highlighting/notes, may not include cdrom or access codes. Customer service is our top priority!. More buying choices from other sellers on AbeBooks. Up the Junction (Virago Modern Classics) Nell Dunn. Published by Penguin Books, 1990. Used - Softcover Condition: Good. Soft cover. Condition: Good. No Jacket. Light edge wear to the wraps. Small stain to the front cover. Hint of page toning. Otherwise a clean, unmarked copy. More buying choices from other sellers on AbeBooks. Up The Junction. Nell Dunn. Published by Pan Books, 1966. Used - Softcover Condition: Good. Condition: Good. 1966. 122 pages. Pictorial paper cover. Pages and binding are presentable with no major defects. Minor issues present such as mild cracking, inscriptions, inserts, light foxing, tanning and thumb marking. Overall a good condition item. Paper cover has mild edge wear with light rubbing and creasing. Some light marking and tanning. Up The Junction. Nell Dunn. Published by Pan Books, 1966. Used - Softcover Condition: Good. Condition: Good. 1966. 122 pages. Pictorial paper cover. Pages and binding are presentable with no major defects. Minor issues present such as mild cracking, inscriptions, inserts, light foxing, tanning and thumb marking. Overall a good condition item. Paper cover has mild edge wear with light rubbing and creasing. Some light marking and tanning. Up the Junction. Nell Dunn. Published by Pan Books, 1966. Used - Softcover Condition: Fair. Condition: Fair. 1966. 5th Printing. 123 pages. Pictorial paper cover. Contains black and white illustrations. Book is in better condition than most examples of this age. Neat, clean, well bound pages with very minimal foxing, tanning and thumbing. Small inscriptions and neat labels may be present. Paper cover has mild edge wear with light rubbing and creasing. Some light marking and tanning. Book is slightly curled. Up The Junction. Nell Dunn. Published by Pan Books, 1966. Used - Softcover Condition: Good. Condition: Good. 1966. 122 pages. Pictorial paper cover. Pages and binding are presentable with no major defects. Minor issues present such as mild cracking, inscriptions, inserts, light foxing, tanning and thumb marking. Overall a good condition item. Paper cover has mild edge wear with light rubbing and creasing. Some light marking and tanning. Up the Junction. Nell Dunn. Published by Pan Books, 1966. Used - Softcover Condition: Good. Condition: Good. 1966. 6th Printing. 126 pages. Pictorial paper cover. Neat, clean, with heavy tanning and foxing to pages and text block edges. Occasional thumbing throughout and mild cracking to front hinge. Paper cover has mild edge wear with light rubbing and creasing. Some light marking and tanning. Up the Junction. Nell Dunn. Published by Pan Books, 1966. Used - Softcover Condition: Fair. Condition: Fair. 1966. 7th Printing. 128 pages. Pictorial paper cover. Neat, clean, with heavy tanning and foxing to pages and text block edges. Occasional thumbing throughout. Paper cover has mild edge wear with light rubbing and creasing. Some light marking and sunning. Up The Junction. Nell Dunn. Published by Pan Books, 1969. Used - Softcover Condition: Very Good. Condition: Very Good. 1969. 12th Printing. 122 pages. Paperback book. Book is in better condition than most examples of this age. Neat, clean, well bound pages with very minimal foxing, tanning and thumbing. Small inscriptions and neat labels may be present. Paper cover has mild edge wear with light rubbing and creasing. Some light marking and sunning. Up the Junction. Nell Dunn. Published by Pan Books, 1966. Used - Softcover Condition: Good. Condition: Good. 1966. 2nd printing. 123 pages. Pictorial paper cover. Unabridged. Illustrated by Susan Benson. Pages and binding are presentable with no major defects. Minor issues present such as light foxing, tanning and thumb marking. Overall a good condition item. Paper cover has mild edge wear with light rubbing and creasing. Some light marking and sunning. Up the Junction. Nell Dunn. Published by Pan Books, 1968. Used - Softcover Condition: Good. Condition: Good. 1968. 11th Printing. 122 pages. Paperback book. Book is in better condition than most examples of this age. Neat, clean, well bound pages with very minimal foxing, tanning and thumbing. Small inscriptions and neat labels may be present. Paper cover has mild edge wear with light rubbing and creasing. Some light marking and sunning. Up the Junction. DUNN, Nell. Published by Pan Books, UK, 1968. Used - Softcover Condition: Good VG. Card Wrappers. Condition: Good VG. Susan Benson (illustrator). 10th PB Printing. Novel of life in London first published in 1963. This book is a Movie Tie-In from the 1968 Paramount movie starring Suzy Kendall and Dennis Waterman. The film's soundtrack was made by Manfred Mann. Photo cover of the female lead, Suzy Kendall. Another scene from the movie on the rear wrapper. Line drawings in the text by Susan Benson.Pan Books X743. 122pp, illustrations. Clean, unmarked interior. Tight, square binding, no spine creases. Bright, clean front wrapper with the remains of an old price-sticker to the top right. Unpacked weight, 86g. Size: 7" Tall. Vintage Paperback. Up the Junction. Nell Dunn. Published by Pan Books, 1968. Used - Softcover Condition: Fair. Condition: Fair. 1968. 8th printing. 123 pages. Pictorial paper cover. Unabridged. Pages and binding are presentable with no major defects. Minor issues present such as mild cracking, inscriptions, light foxing, tanning and thumb marking. Paper cover has minor wear with slight marks, creases, some sunning and modest edge wear. A few large liquid droplet marks to front.