Book Reviews

'Windmill Land' 1916 by Allen Clarke can be viewed online as an eBook:  www.windmillsworldwide.com

 

ALLEN CLARKE

(1863-1935) 

THE MILLGATE MONTHLY

Daily Dispatch-“Allen  Clarke- Teddy Ashton – is the inimitable writer of Lancashire stories.”

 

ManchesterGuardian- “No forcing of pathos, and the humour is capital.”

 

YorkshirePost- “Lines of prose that lilt with melody.”

 

Daily Mail- “A book that all England ought to read.”

 

T.P’S & Cassell’s Weekly- “Fascinating.”

 

The Times- “As an historical novel this book deserves to rank high.”

 

The Tatler (London)- “A most delightful volume.” “Fascinating.”

 

THE MILLGATE MONTHLY. (April, 1919),

 

In a biographical sketch by Harford Willson (under the title of, “Modern Influences.”) says:

Novelist ,poet, sociologist, dialect writer, Allen Clarke (Teddy Ashton,’ Ben Adhem,’’Speedwell,’ ‘Capanbells’) has touched life at diverse points. To some his work as a story writer-and he is Lancashire’s best known novelist- is his best claim to fame. Others believe that the Lancashire folk-speech owes as great a debt to him as it does to Waugh, Brierley, Laycock and Trafford Clegg, whilst to another set of readers his fine work on behalf of democratic causes will keep his name remembered when most of his contemporaries are forgotten. His fine descriptive powers, wonderful personality, rare imagination and abundant humour would have earned him a fortune had he cared to become a fashionable writer….Yet he is a popular author, and has a wide public. His paper, Teddy Ashton’s Weekly, which he started himself with no capital, attained a sale of 35,000 copies weekly (and he ran it for a dozen years till he was offered an important position on the Liverpool Weekly Post. His Lancashire Annual (running successfully since 1891) has a large, and as much as half-a-guinea has been given for number 1 (published at 2p) His Lancashire sketch, “Eaur Sarah’s Chap,” is in the opinion of many critics, the finest Lancashire dialect sketch ever written….

Probably the proudest moment of Allen  Clarke’s life was one summer  day when 10,000 readers of the Weekly, from all parts of Lancashire, Yorkshire, Cheshire, and even places further a-field- one old man said he had come 100 miles to shake hands with Teddy Ashton- held a picnic at Barrow Bridge (the one time deserted village of a book of his, which revived the place and made it a picnic resort) ….But probably no other work of Allen Clarke’s is of such epoch-making character as his “Effects of The Factory System (Steam Engine Land) which caused considerable sensation and newspaper controversy, and questions in the British and Colonial Parliaments….All Allen Clarke’s work, whether humorous sketch, absorbing story, or arresting essay, is characterised by a strong sympathy with the downtrodden, a hatred of humbug, a love of fair play, and an unfailing faith in the ultimate triumph of the principles of world-wide fellowship.”

 

WHAT THE PRESS SAID ABOUT ALLEN CLARKE'S BOOKS IN 1900 

As the following extracts from newspapers show, in electing Allen Clarke to represent Rochdale in Parliament you will be electing a man who has by his own talent and energy, raised himself from a factory lad to a proud position in Literary and reform ranks in Britain. A man who is not only loved in Lancashire for his brightness and humorous writings, but known all over England for the literary successes he has achieved in Fiction, poetry and in sociology. From hundreds of similar notices we select the following:

 

  • The London Echo:
  • In Lancshire he is better known for his dialect sketches. He has created in Bill and Betty Spriggs a couple who are as though they are living amongst us. The son of parents who worked in mills and a mill boy alongside his sisters and brother and whose father married a factory lass.
  • The Bolton Review:
  • Allen Clarke is known for a broad humanity, a tender symopathy with the poor, afflicted and suffering. An honest hatred of cant and hypocrisy, a love of truth and justice, a belief in the brotherhood of man and genial wit and humour, ever trying to look on the bright side.
  • The Spectator
  • The Knobstick is a powerful story depicting the struggles and hardships, the grim endurance and the atmosphere of of squalid vice of a manufacturing town, our author has dipped a pen of unusual vigour in ink of an acid and biting nature. Nor are the artistic points of a story wanting. Allen has succeeded in painting a striking  view of labour and its realities and wrongs.
  • The London Star
  • A novel has rarely appeared at a more oppurtune moment than The Knobstick a story of love and labour. Terse good English.
  • The Literary World
  • It is no surprise that the agitations which have been so violently convulsing the world of labour should be reflected in fiction. The book contains a good deal of plain speaking on various subjects.
  • The Huddersfield Examiner
  • There is an atmosphere of romance amid the the murkier side atmosphere of such towns as Spindleton and it is a book with a purpose of dramatic interest on life in Lancashire in modern dress.
  • The Newsagent and Bookseller's Review
  • The Knobstick which is featured in the County of Palestine has scarcely been credited with its worth
  • The Manchester Guardian
  • 'Tales of a Deserted Village,' will increase the reputation which the author has gained by its powerful story. Mr Clarke is one of the few living novelists whose intimacy with the feelings and mental habits of the poor strikes us as complete and genuine and the occasional humour is often capital.
  • The London Sun
  • A powerful and well written bookand is worthy of the most brilliant writer, weird, sad and pathetic...beautiful.
  • Today
  • An old Tory myself I can listen to another man's argumens without getting escited. This being so, the Socialistic tendency of Mr Allen Clarke's book of poems, 'Voices,' did not detract from the enjoyment I experienced in the perusal of it.I must own to his having filled me with the enthusiastic glow that marks his work. He is the poet of the people, the toilers in the mills and factories. His clear, sharp note rings like the blow of a sledgehammer on the anvil, or the click of a weavers loom and it is natural and heartfelt.
  • London Daily Chronicle
  • 'Voices and other Verses,' are informed with a real sincerity, a striving conviction of the brotherhood of man and something like the true spirit.
  • These were the supporting statements for Allen to get his parliament seat, unfortunately this was not to be. Allen's brother Tom, twenty years younger attended his address in Rochdale and said Allen was disappointed but it never deterred his spirit and the good of his fellow men, women and children.

 

Shirley Matthews B.A. (Hons)

Allen Clarke’s Grandaughter

 

21 November 2008, shirley