{"id":27852,"date":"2023-04-14T09:00:01","date_gmt":"2023-04-14T09:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=27852"},"modified":"2023-04-13T17:00:17","modified_gmt":"2023-04-13T17:00:17","slug":"the-fosdyke-saga-volume-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2023\/04\/14\/the-fosdyke-saga-volume-1\/","title":{"rendered":"The Fosdyke Saga volume 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"
\nBy Bill Tidy<\/strong> (Wolfe Publishing)
\nISBN: 72340499-2\/978-0-72340-499-6 (Landscape PB)<\/p>\n

The world became a far less smart and infinitely grimmer place over the last weeks, due to the loss of three cartooning giants many of you have probably never heard of. <\/em><\/p>\n

As so little of their superb output is readily accessible to digital-age readers, I\u2019m celebrating their amazing achievements and acknowledging my personal debt to them here with items that can still be easily sourced and the heartfelt advice that if you like to laugh and have a surreal bent, these are comedy craftsmen you need to know. <\/em><\/p>\n

Today, let\u2019s plunge full-on into a lost world of sheerly startling shoddy grandeur\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n

William Edward \u201cBill\u201d Tidy (MBE) was born on the 9th<\/sup> of October 1933 and died on March 11th<\/sup> 2023. For most of those 89 years he charmed people and made them laugh. Happily, many of his books are available digitally, although incomprehensibly not his sublimely daft (and that\u2019s \u201cDaffft\u201d as in daffodil not \u201cDarhhhhhhhhhhft\u201d as in Dalek or Darling) 14 volume \u201cmagnificent octopus\u201d The Fosdyke Saga<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

But first, a few words about amusing folk\u2026<\/p>\n

Nothing is universally funny, but other people\u2019s idiosyncrasies come pretty close. Comedy is cruel and can be mean-spirited at its core: it all depends on who\u2019s saying what and how. Bill Tidy\u2019s Fosdyke Saga is a grand exemplar: combining a smart, painfully self-aware surreal blend of parody, insular localised legend and working-class aspiration with sheer surrealism.<\/p>\n

It is therefore utterly inexplicable to the young or the \u201cJohnny Foreigner\u201d of our Empire Days. In this case that also includes people of other utterly alien cultures – like Americans or Millennials – but also probably incorporates anyone British from further south than bucolic Berkhamsted in Hertfordshire, or Buckinghamshire\u2019s austere Aston Clinton and hoity-toity Tring.<\/p>\n

Indeed, rumour has it that until recently, travellers using the Grand Union Canal – grizzled, gruff and grubby bargees hauling coal and rubbing liniment down to the sunlit uplands whilst posh snobs pleasure-boating as disaster tourists trekked a little way into the grim north – had to have their passports checked and stamped at the Apsley\/Kings Langley buffer quay\u2026<\/p>\n

Seriously though, once upon a time British humour was fiercely and proudly local, regional and factional: cherishing warring accents and nurturing civic rivalries, ancient prejudices (still got plenty of them, though, Ta Very Much!!) and generational grudges. Midlands comedians weren\u2019t funny in Glasgow and Manchester mirth-makers stayed the heck out of Liverpool. But then, after the war – the second one – we began homogenising aspects of life.<\/p>\n

In the world of laughter, everything now had a manic, off-kilter skew. Random madcappery abounded where once only genteel wit grazed. The Goon Show<\/strong> and its bastard offspring Do Not Adjust Your Set<\/strong> and Monty Python\u2019s Flying Circus<\/strong> challenged the rational senses whilst racism, sexism, jingoism, wife\/mother-in-law jokes, illicit sex, smut, double entendres, \u201cmy doctor said\u201d and sporting jibes could no longer securely address all our giggling needs.<\/p>\n

Over in a corner somewhere, the bigger picture, establishment inertia and adamantine class structures were still being poked at by a dying cadre of satirists. Then, suddenly, it were 1971 and cartoonist Bill Tidy had a splendidly wicked idea\u2026<\/p>\n

He was born in Tranmere, Cheshire and proudly embraced his Northern working-class heritage in everything he did. Raised and educated in Liverpool, his first published work was a cartoon in his school magazine.<\/p>\n

Bill joined the Royal Engineers in 1952 and made his first professional cartoon sale three years later whilst posted in Japan. Demobbed and back in Blighty, Tidy joined a Liverpool art agency, creating small ads and doing illustrations for various magazines, and sold his cartoons wherever he could.<\/p>\n

Regular clients soon included The Daily Mirror<\/strong> and Daily Sketch<\/strong> so he moved down to London. Time passed and he met other freelancers and in 1966 co-founded a workers club – The British Cartoonists Association. A true wit and natural raconteur, he was mesmerising to listen to and even more so if you were lucky enough to chat with him over a pint\u2026<\/p>\n

Although a master of done-in-one single image gags – such as the immortal \u201cIs There Any news of the Iceberg?\u201d<\/strong> (look it up – both the cartoon itself and the illustrated autobiography it now fronts), Tidy inevitably told big stories. He cherished strong narratives powering the engines of his work, and his tales were delivered in a loose flowing, hyper-energetic style perfectly carrying the machine-gun rapidity of his ideas and whacky wordplay.<\/p>\n

In April 1967 he created The Cloggies – an Everyday Saga in the Life of Clog Dancing Folk –<\/strong> which ran in Private Eye<\/strong> until 1981 and thereafter The Listener<\/strong> until 1986. He had a few comic residencies: weird\/evil science spoof Grimbledon Down<\/strong> (1970-1994 in New Scientist<\/strong>), Dr. Whittle<\/strong> (1970-2001 in General Practitioner) and – from 1974 – imbibers strip Kegbusters<\/strong> in the Campaign for Real Ale\u2019s periodical What\u2019s Brewing? <\/strong>Other regular venues included Classic FM Magazine<\/strong>, The Oldie<\/strong>, The Mail on Sunday<\/strong>, The Yorkshire Post<\/strong> and Punch<\/strong>. When that last venerable humour institution (1841-2002) went bust, Tidy unsuccessfully tried to buy it and keep it going\u2026<\/p>\n

Tidy also authored 20 books and illustrated 70 more. If you\u2019re interested, my favourites are The Bedside Book of Final Words<\/strong> and Disgraceful Archaeology: or Things You Shouldn\u2019t Know About the History of Mankind<\/strong>\u2026<\/p>\n

From cartooning and dedicated charity work with the Lords Taverners, he latterly drifted into radio and TV presentation, appearing on or hosting shows such as I\u2019m Sorry I Haven\u2019t a Clue<\/strong>, Draw Me<\/strong>, Countdown<\/strong>, Watercolour Challenge<\/strong>, Blankety Blank<\/strong> and Countryfile<\/strong>. There will never be another like him.<\/p>\n

The best way to remember him is through his work: most notably the multi-volume Fosdyke Saga<\/strong> as gathered in collections from the 1970s and 1980s (but not so much the 2016 compilation).<\/p>\n

Perhaps a little context is appropriate. In 1906, author John Galsworthy began in The Man of Property<\/strong> a sequence of novels detailing the lives of an English upper-middle class \u201cnew money\u201d family. Spanning half a century (1886-1936) and augmented by In Chancery<\/strong> and To Let<\/strong>, the generational tale was formally repackaged as The Forsyte Saga<\/strong> in 1922. From then onwards, the societal epic has been adapted regularly as movies, immense radio plays and – in 1967 – a groundbreaking BBC television serial. Galsworthy wrote two more trilogies of novels plus spin-off \u201cinterludes\u201d – like Indian Summer of a Forsyte<\/strong> and Awakening<\/strong> – cumulatively known as the Forsyte Chronicles<\/strong>. The effort won him 1932\u2019s Nobel Prize for Literature.<\/p>\n

Generally, it all showed how even posh folk don\u2019t get to be secure or content and remains a powerful literary presence. The saga was revived in 1994 in a new novel by Suleika Dawson.<\/p>\n

The British truly love their television and the BBC especially have produced numerous game changing dramas – everything from the Quatermass<\/strong> stories to I, Claudius<\/strong>. However, their 26-part Forsyte Saga<\/strong> adaptation utterly captivated viewers in a whole new way, so in regard to what\u2019s we\u2019re reviewing here, a little further clarification is required.<\/p>\n

The Galsworthy adaptation had originally run from January 7th<\/sup> to July 1st<\/sup> 1967, in BBC 1\u2019s prestigious prime Saturday slot. It was augmented by repeat showings three days later on BBC 2, and the entire series was re-screened on Sundays from September 8th<\/sup> 1968 with the final episode in 1969 seen by 18 million viewers. Overseas sales were staggering (it was the first BBC product sold to the Soviet Union!) and worldwide viewing figures topped in excess of 160 million. All this in the era before home recordings were available. If you missed an episode of anything, all you could was endure other people\u2019s smug gloating\u2026<\/p>\n

The TV sensation inspired much imitation, such as ITV\u2019s Upstairs Downstairs<\/strong>, which ran on Sundays from October 10th<\/sup> 1971 to December 21st<\/sup> 1975\u2026 just as Bill Tidy\u2019s delirious spoof was hitting its baggy-trousered stride\u2026<\/p>\n

I mention this simply because Upstairs Downstairs<\/strong> also highlighted disparities, similarities and interactions of upper-class toffs and working people in a weekly accessible form, but explored the same Edwardian and Georgian eras as Tidy\u2019s wickedly whacky wonders. It ensured the cartoon\u2019s strong historical underpinnings were familiar to the hoi-polloi Daily Mirror<\/strong> readership who might have slept through school, but avidly paid attention to the goggle box\u2026<\/p>\n

Just like its inspiration, The Fosdyke Saga<\/strong> is no stranger to media adaptations: spawning a TV series, a play co-written by Alan Plater, two radio series and latterday sequels\u2026<\/p>\n

Describing itself as \u201ca classic tale of Struggle, Power, Personalities and Tripe\u201d the story follows Josiah Fosdyke<\/em> and his family, who in 1900 emigrate from Lancashire mining town Griddlesbury to cosmopolitan Manchester. The move follows another near-death experience \u201cdown pit\u201d as the aspiration scab labourer crosses picket lines and nearly ends up another casualty of \u201cKing Coal\u201d\u2026<\/p>\n

Resolved that this is no way to get ahead, Jos, wife Rebecca<\/em>, daughter Victoria<\/em> and sons Tom<\/em>, Albert<\/em> and newborn Tim<\/em> eschew aid from Becky\u2019s wealthy brother and head for Manchester – \u201cwhere streets are studded wi\u2019 meat pies!\u201d\u2026<\/p>\n

A chance meeting with old Ben Ditchley<\/em> – the Lancashire Tripe King – sets them on the path to prosperity. As Jos repeatedly impresses the self-made millionaire with his cunning and ruthless work ethic, Ditchley\u2019s dissolute son Roger<\/em> dishonours and debauches Vicky and ultimately is disinherited in Fosdyke\u2019s favour. The end result is by-blow Sylvia Fosdyke<\/em>, Victoria\u2019s radicalisation and eternal involvement with the paramilitary wing of the Women\u2019s Suffrage Movement and Roger\u2019s lifelong vendetta to crush the family who cost him his inheritance\u2026<\/p>\n

The Fosdyke Saga<\/strong> ran from March 1971 to February 1985 and was purportedly personally killed by unctuous, sleazily gentrifying corporate bandit Robert Maxwell after he acquired Mirror Group Newspapers in 1984. This volume is a severely edited compilation of the first few years of the sublime bizarre strip, packed with gags about fierce powerful women (many with full beards and steel toecap boots), privation, music halls, and new inventions. It\u2019s populated by rogues, scoundrels, wastrels and gobsmacked bystanders, and stuffed with shocking foodstuffs like pigs trotters, cowheels, tripe and assorted offal, pigs ears and pickled cabbage, Bavarian Death\u2019s Head Infantry Sausage, Sauerkraut und Schweinwurst and Tinned Tripe for the Troops, all of which act as milestones tracing Fosdyke fortunes in war and peace\u2026<\/p>\n

After inheriting old Ben\u2019s business, Jos imaginatively expands and diversifies, but family troubles and Roger\u2019s machinations constantly confound his plans for repast supremacy. Sub-plots reference contemporary turning points like the Titanic\u2019s launch, the Salvation Army movement, suffragettes and the King\u2019s horse, poverty, depression and the day-by day-absurdist drama of the Great War at home, at the Front and everywhere in between\u2026<\/p>\n

We see how Tom converts from staunch Conscientious Objector to trench infantryman\/POW (with Jos naturally seeking to corner the white feather trade), and Albert\u2019s astounding duel of wills and imagination with Red Baron Von Richthoven<\/em> and sordid French air ace Marcel Waive<\/em>, as well as Tom\u2019s thriving prison camp restaurant trade.<\/p>\n

The tripeworks is sabotaged and bombed by zeppelins and Jos is accused of being the Salford Ripper<\/em>, before being blackmailed by Roger for colluding with the enemy, but always the Fosdykes soldier on\u2026<\/p>\n

High points for young Ditchley include sending aviator Albert on countless suicide missions, fomenting the Manchester Tripe Wars, seducing a quasi-mystical Tripe Inspector, and hiring the murderous O\u2019Malley Sisters<\/em> to crush Jos\u2019 trade. When Ditchley\u2019s scheme is quashed by Vicky\u2019s suffragette comrades, the cad enlists \u201cLegendary Lancashire Lothario\u201d T. Edgar Shufflebottom<\/em> to seduce them in job lots, before being foiled by a simple twist of fate\u2026<\/p>\n

When straightforward murder fails too, Roger blackmails \u201cRussian Nightingale\u201d Nadine Buzom<\/em> into compromising Jos just as little Tim ships out as a cabin boy and is lost at sea\u2026<\/p>\n

With the war ended, attacks on the factory resume, Albert is lost in an air race that lands him and Albion\u2019s adored aviatrix the Hon. Cynthia Spofforth<\/em> at the mercy of a lusty and frustrated Arab sheik and Tom heads west to America\u2019s ease Prohibition woes with Fosdyke\u2019s latest innovation. Sadly, Ditchley is already there, getting rich in Chicago with whisky-soaked offal in his illicit Tripe-Easy\u2026<\/p>\n

As Tom joins Elliot Ness<\/em> and the Untouchables, the volume ends with Jos\u2019s hunger to expand his markets landing him in big trouble: held captive by a Soviet Commissar who just wanted a million tons of free tripe for her starving people\u2026 until the elder Fosdyke\u2019s devastatingly manly demeanour turns her Red head\u2026<\/p>\n

A forgotten treat for us oldsters and a potential new delight for smart youngsters, Bill Tidy\u2019s surreal tour de force is a delicious treat just waiting to be rediscovered. Over to you\u2026
\n\u00a9 Daily Mirror Newspapers Limited 1972.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Bill Tidy (Wolfe Publishing) ISBN: 72340499-2\/978-0-72340-499-6 (Landscape PB) The world became a far less smart and infinitely grimmer place over the last weeks, due to the loss of three cartooning giants many of you have probably never heard of. As so little of their superb output is readily accessible to digital-age readers, I\u2019m celebrating … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “The Fosdyke Saga volume 1”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[90,113,125,127],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27852","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cartooning-classics","category-comedy","category-humour","category-nostalgia"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-7fe","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27852","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27852"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27852\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":27856,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27852\/revisions\/27856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27852"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27852"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27852"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}