The Goldberg Variations

by Mark Glanville

From football hooligan to opera singer, from the Cockney Reds to Catullus, from a hectic household to tranquility of spirit, Mark Glanville has travelled many paths, been many people this is his remarkable story.The story of Mark Glanvilles journey from violently bullied Jewish boy (Goldberg is the real family name) at Pimlico comprehensive to Principal Bass with the Lisbon Opera via a period travelling the country as a member of the Cockney Reds, the notorious Manchester United-supporting hooligans.Throughout all these vastly opposed phases and worlds, Glanvilles driving force is his search for self-knowledge. His home life is overshadowed by the larger-than-life character of his famous father and his extensive philandering, his mothers obsession with psychotherapy and hostile relationships with his siblings. He fights to defend his Jewishness at school, only to be told by his father that he has no right to call himself one. A bookish teenager Glanville is obsessed with jazz and opera but he spends his weekends with a group of hooligans who are unsure whether to accept him or beat him up because of his posh accent. Then reading Classics at Oxford (explaining his absence away to the Cockney Reds as a four-year prison sentence for manslaughter) he is simultaneously drawn to and repelled by the Oxbridge society set. The story of his struggle towards equilibrium, to learn from his own and his familys mistakes, and to find his own identity, eventually re-embracing Judaism and music, is both gripping and inspiring.An impressive new voice, Mark Glanville writes with refreshing honesty, humour and a complete lack of sentimentality. The utterly opposing aspects of his life make for a sometimes controversial but always fascinating read.

Paperback

First published January 1, 2003

Reviews

[Hecate Wight]

Inspired by the author's recent confessional piece in the Sunday Times, I bought this. Swift-moving and highly entertaining. Also moving in his search for an identity. Not sure it's worked out for him.

[Steve T]

"Wickedly candid" (Jewish Chronicle) summed it up pretty well.

[Jonny Brick]

Boy comes of age via Holland Park, Oxford, Old Trafford and the opera house. Lots of fumblings and teenage angst, and very good on 1970s hooligan culture. Plenty of stuff about dad Brian too.

[Matt]

I read this after I listened the author being interviewed on the radio. He talked about, among other things, his wife's fear that he would start going back to football matches again, as the sights and sounds conjure up the adrenaline and excitement of the terrace conflicts.

The themes that this book describes was pertinent to me at the time, as I was working in the NHS as a senior nurse whilst 'studying' Systema (the Russian special forces combat system '. I had been recommended by one of the guys that I trained with for a job has a night-club bouncer, the juxtaposition that found myself in was similar to the author.

The score I gave to this book is relative the the dearth of similar books focusing on middle-class street violence.