To Lin Hardcastle
childhood friend
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Penguin Books is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com
First published in Great Britain by Methuen 1989
Published in Mandarin Paperbacks 1990
Reprinted in Arrow Books 1998
Published in Penguin Books 2003
Copyright © Sue Townsend, 1989
All rights reserved
The moral right of the author has been asserted
Cover illustration by Alice Tait
Love Heart image kindly reproduced with permission from Swizzles Matlow Limited
ISBN: 978-0-141-96293-1
Author’s Preface
Adrian Albert Mole
Adrian Mole’s Christmas
The Mole/Mancini Letters
A Letter to the BBC
Adrian Mole on ‘Pirate Radio Four’
Art, Culture and Politics
A Mole in Moscow
Mole on Lifestyle
Mole’s Prizewinning Essay
The Sarah Ferguson Affair
The Mole/Kent Letters
Adrian Mole Leaves Home
Mole at the Department of the Environment
Susan Lilian Townsend
Majorca
Writing for Television
Russia
Why I Like England
Margaret Hilda Roberts
The Secret Diary of Margaret Hilda Roberts Aged 14¼
Correspondence of a Queen in Waiting
Follow Penguin
Dearest reader,
Since the scandal broke about the so-called ‘five dwarves in a bed’ affair (though I still maintain there were only four) I have seldom visited civilization; my meagre supplies are delivered to me by donkey carrier every second Tuesday. I collect peat from the moors for my fire and I draw water from a well conveniently situated only three miles from my cottage. Thus my needs are satisfied.
What care I for the trappings of success? What joy did I ever get from wearing Joy perfume? None – only more mosquito bites when I went abroad.
The occasional visitor brings me news of London’s vibrant literary scene. Sometimes they bring commissions; it is by this method that I finance my chosen frugal lifestyle. This book is a collection of some of the articles and essays I have written over the past few years.
There is also some previously unpublished material, The Prison Letters between A. Mole and Barry Kent, for example. And some poetry written by A. Mole (included here only because he threatened to starve himself to death unless I agreed).
Mole’s blackmailing tactics have succeeded to the extent that he has the lion’s share of this book, though I must stress that this is not a ‘Mole Book’; Margaret Hilda Roberts and I also contribute.
Old Hag Cottage
Top-O-Hill
Black Moor
Nr Buxton
April 1989
Adrian Albert Mole. Adrian Albert Mole was the editor and main contributor to the Neil Armstrong Comprehensive School magazine, The Voice of Youth.
Since then his poems have appeared in the Leicester Mercury and the Skegness Herald. A volume of his poems entitled The Restless Tadpole was printed by Vanity Publishers Ltd, in 1987.
He is currently writing a novel about the East Midlands called Lo! the Flat Hills of My Homeland.
Adrian Mole lives in Leicester with his dog. In 1986 he won record damages against the failed novelist Sue Townsend after she published his diaries claiming that they were her own works of fiction.
Margaret Hilda Roberts. These diary entries were found between the pages of The Be-Ro Cook Book for Girls at a car boot sale in Grantham on a Bank Holiday Monday in 1988.
Nothing (unfortunately) is known about Margaret Hilda Roberts or what became of her. The diary is believed to have been written in the nineteen thirties.
Susan Lilian Townsend. Enjoyed notoriety at one time but has sunk into obscurity since her involvement in the ‘five dwarves in a bed’ scandal in 1989 for which she received a suspended prison sentence of two years. The judge’s remarks were widely reported in the popular press: ‘To think that a woman of your age could stoop so low.’
Since the scandal she has lived in isolation in a bleak moorland cottage near to Buxton. She alleges that her only companions are a family of curlews and a large fungus growing in the corner of her living room. She is forty-three.
Christmas Eve
Something dead strange has happened to Christmas. It’s just not the same as it used to be when I was a kid. In fact I’ve never really got over the trauma of finding out that my parents had been lying to me annually about the existence of Santa Claus.
To me then, at the age of eleven, Santa Claus was a bit like God, all-seeing, all-knowing, but without the lousy things that God allows to happen: earthquakes, famines, motorway crashes. I would lie in bed under the blankets (how crude the word blankets sounds today when we are all conversant with the Tog rating of continental quilts), my heart pounding and palms sweaty in anticipation of the virgin Beano album. I would imagine big jolly Santa looking from his celestial sledge over our cul-de-sac and saying to his elves. ‘Give Adrian Mole something decent this year. He is a good lad. He never forgets to put the lavatory seat down.’ Ah … the folly of the child!
Alas, now at the age of maturity (sixteen years, eight months and twenty-two days, five hours and six minutes) … I know that my parents walk around the town centre wild-eyed with consumer panic chanting desperately, ‘What shall we get for Adrian?’ Is it any wonder that Christmas Eve has lost its awe?
2.15am Just got back from the Midnight Service. As usual it dragged on far too long. My mother started getting fidgety after the first hour of the Co-op young wives’ carols. She kept whispering, ‘I shall have to go home soon or that bloody turkey will never be thawed out for the morning.’
Once again the Nativity Playlet was ruined by having a live donkey in the church. It never behaves itself, and always causes a major disturbance, so why does the vicar inflict it on us? OK so his brother-in-law runs a donkey sanctuary, but so what?
To be fair, the effect of the Midnight Service was dead moving. Even to me who is a committed nihilistic existentialist.
Christmas Day
Not a bad collection of presents considering my Dad’s redundant. I got the grey zip-up cardigan I asked for. My mother said, ‘If you want to look like a sixteen-year-old Frank Bough then go ahead and wear the thing!’
The Oxford Dictionary will come in useful for increasing my word power. But the best present of all was the electric shaver. I have already had three shaves. My chin is as smooth as a billiard ball. Somebody should get one for Leon Brittan. It is not good for Britain’s image for a cabinet minister to go around looking like a gangster who has been in the cells of a New York Police Station all night.
The lousy Sugdens, my mother’s inbred Norfolk relations, turned up at 11.30am. So I got my parents out of bed and then retired to my room to read my Beano annual. Perhaps I am too worldly and literate nowadays, but I was quite disappointed at its childish level of humour.
I emerged from my room in time for Christmas dinner and was forced to engage the Sugdens in conversation. They told me in minute, mind-boggling detail about the life-cycle of King Edward potatoes, from tuber to chip pan. They were not a bit interested in my conversation about the Norwegian leather industry. In fact they looked bored. Just my luck to have philistines for relations. Dinner was late as usual. My mother has never learnt the secret of co-ordinating the ingredients of a meal. Her gravy is always made before the roast potatoes have turned brown. I went into the kitchen to give her some advice, but she shouted, ‘Bugger off out’ through the steam. When it came the meal was quite nice but there was no witty repartee over the table; not a single hilarious anecdote was told. In fact I wish I’d had my Xmas dinner with Ned Sherrin. His relations are dead lucky to have him. I bet their sides ache from laughing.
The Sugdens don’t approve of drink, so every time my parents even looked at a bottle of spirits they tightened their lips and sipped their tea. (And yes it is possible to do both, I’ve seen it with my own eyes.) In the evening we all had a desultory game of cards. Grandad Sugden won four thousand pounds off my father. There was a lot of joking about my father giving Grandad Sugden an IOU but father said to me in the kitchen, ‘No way am I putting my name to paper, that mean old git would have me in court as fast as you could say King Edward!’
The Sugdens went to bed early on our rusty camp beds. They are leaving for Norfolk at dawn because they are worried about potato poachers. I now know why my mother turned out to be wilful and prone to alcohol abuse. It is a reaction against her lousy moronic upbringing in the middle of the potato fields of Norfolk.
Boxing Day
I was woken at dawn by the sound of Grandad Sugden’s rusty Ford Escort refusing to start. I know I should have gone down into the street and helped to push it but Grandma Sugden seemed to be doing all right on her own. It must be all those years of flinging sacks of potatoes about. My parents were wisely pretending to be asleep, but I know they were awake because I could hear coarse laughter coming from their bedroom, and when the Sugdens’ engine came alive and the Escort finally turned the corner of our cul-de-sac I distinctly heard the sound of a champagne cork popping and the chink of glasses. Not to mention the loud ‘Cheers’.
Went back to sleep but the dog licked me awake at 9.30, so I took it for a walk past Pandora’s house. Her dad’s Volvo wasn’t in the drive so they must still be staying with their rich relations. On the way I passed Barry Kent, who was kicking a football up against the wall of the old people’s home. He seemed full of seasonal goodwill for once and I stopped to talk with him. He asked what I’d had for Christmas; I told him and I asked him what he’d had. He looked embarrassed and said, ‘I ain’t ’ad much this year ’cos our dad’s lost his job.’ I asked him what happened. He said, ‘I dunno. Our dad says Mrs Thatcher took it off him.’ I said, ‘What, personally?’ Barry shrugged and said, ‘Well that’s what our dad reckons.’
Barry asked me back to his house for a cup of tea so I went to show that I bore him no grudge from the days when he used to demand money with menaces from me. The outside of the Kents’ council house looked very grim (Barry told me that the council have been promising to mend the fences, doors and windows for years) but the inside looked magical. Paper chains were hung everywhere, almost completely hiding the cracks in the walls and ceilings. Mr Kent had been out in the community and found a large branch, painted it with white gloss paint and stuck it into the empty paint tin. This branch effectively took the place of a Christmas tree in my opinion, but Mrs Kent said, sadly, ‘But it’s not the same really, not if the only reason you’ve got it is because you can’t afford to have a real, plastic one.’ I was going to say that their improvised tree was modernistic and Hi Tech but I kept my mouth shut.
I asked the Kent children what they’d had for Christmas and they said, ‘Shoes.’ So I had to pretend to admire them. I had no choice because they kept sticking them under my nose. Mrs Kent laughed and said, ‘And Mr Kent and me gave each other a packet of fags!’ As you know, dear diary, I disapprove of smoking but I could understand their need to have a bit of pleasure at Christmas so I didn’t give them my anti-smoking lecture.
I didn’t like to ask any more questions and politely declined the mince pies they offered … from where I was sitting I could see into their empty pantry.
Walking back home I wondered how my parents were able to buy decent Christmas presents for me. After all my father and Mr Kent were both innocent victims of the robot culture where machines are preferred to people.
As I came through our back door I found out. My father was saying, ‘But how the hell am I going to pay the next Access bill, Pauline?’ My mother said, ‘We’ll have to sell something George, whatever happens we’ve got to hang on to at least one credit card because it’s impossible to live on the dole and social security!’
So my family’s Christmas prosperity is a thin veneer. We’ve had it on credit.
In the afternoon we went round to Grandma’s for Boxing Day tea. As she slurped out the trifle she complained bitterly about her Christmas Day spent at the Evergreen Club. She said, ‘I knew I shouldn’t have gone; that filthy communist Bert Baxter got disgustingly drunk on a box of liqueur chocolates and sang crude words at the Carol Service!’
My father said, ‘You should have come to us, mum, I did ask you!’
Grandma said, ‘You only asked me once and anyway the Sugdens were there.’ This last remark offended my mother; she is always criticizing her family but she hates anybody else to do the same. The tea ended in disaster when I broke a willow pattern plate that Grandma has had for years. I know Grandma loves me but I have to record that on this occasion she looked at me with murder in her eyes. She said, ‘Nobody will ever know what that plate meant to me!’ I offered to pick the pieces up but she pushed me away with the end of the hand brush. I went into the bathroom to cool down. After twenty minutes my mother banged on the door and said, ‘C’mon, Adrian, we’re going home. Grandma’s just told your dad that it’s his own fault he’s been made redundant.’ As I passed through the living room the silence between my father and my grandma was as solid as a double-glazed window.
As we passed Pandora’s house in the car, I saw that the fairy lights on the fir tree in her garden were switched on, so I asked my parents to drop me off. Pandora was ecstatic to see me at first. She raved about the present I bought her (a solid gold bracelet from Tesco’s, £2.49) but after a while she cooled a bit and started going on about the Christmas house-party she’d been to. She made a lot of references to a boy called Crispin Wartog-Lowndes. Apparently he is an expert rower and he rowed Pandora across a lake on Christmas Day. Whilst doing so he quoted from the works of Percy Bysshe Shelley. According to Pandora there was a mist on the lake. I got into a silent jealous rage and imagined pushing Crispin Wartog-Lowndes’s aristocratic face under the lake until he’d forgotten Pandora, Christmas and Shelley. I got into bed at 1am, worn out with all the emotion. In fact, as I lay in the dark, tears came to my eyes; especially when I remembered the Kents’ empty pantry.
January 1st 1985
From
Hamish Mancini
196 West Houston Street
New York, NY
Hi there Aidy!
How are you kid? … How’s the zits … your face still look like the surface of the moon? Hey don’t worry, I gotta cure. You rub the corpse of a dead frog into your face at night. Do you have frogs in England? … Your mum gotta blender? … OK, here’s what you do:
- You find a dead frog.
- You put it in the blender. (Gory, but you don’t have to look.)
- You depress the button for 30 seconds. (Neither do you have to listen.)
- You pour the resulting gunk into a jar.
- You wash the blender, huh?
- Last thing at night (clean your teeth first) you apply the gunk to your face. It works! I now gotta complexion like a baby’s ass. Hey! It was great reading your diary, even the odd unflattering remark about me. Still, old buddy, I forgive you on account of how you were of unsound mind at the time you wrote the stuff. An’ I got questions …
- What does RSPCA stand for?
- Who’s Malcolm Muggeridge?
- For chrissake, what are PE shorts?
- Is the Morning Star a commie newspaper?
- Where’s Skegness? … What’s Skegness rock?
- ‘V’ signs? … Like Churchill the war leader?
- Toad in the Hole, is it food or what?
- Woodbines? … Bert Baxter smokes flowers?
- Family Allowance … is this a charity handout?
- Kevin Keegan … who is he?
- Barclaycard … what is it?
- Yorkshire Puddings … what are they?
- Broadcasting House?
- How much in dollars is 25 pence?
- Is a Mars Bar candy?
- Is Sainsbury’s a hypermarket?
- What’s the PDSA, some kinda animal hospital?
- GCEs, what are they?
- Think I can guess what Big and Bouncy magazine is like … but gimme some details, kid?
- Bovril – sounds disgusting! … Is it?
- Evergreens? … Explain please.
- Social Services?
- Spotted Dick… jeezus! … This some sexual disease?
- Is a ‘detention centre’ jail?
- You bought your mother ‘Black Magic’ – what is she, a witch or something?
- Where’s Sheffield?
- What’s Habitat?
- Radio Four, is it some local station?
- ‘O’ level what?
- What is a copper’s nark?
- Noddy? That the goon in the little car?
- Dole … ‘Social Security’ … is this like our Welfare?
- Sir Edmund Hillary … he a relation of yours?
- Alma Cogan … she a singer?
- Lucozade … did you get drunk?
- What’s a conker?
- The dog is AWOL … what is or was AWOL?
- Who is or was Noel Coward?
- What is BUPA?
- What are ‘wellingtons’?
- Who is Tony Benn?
- Petrol … you mean gas?
- Is The Archers a radio serial about Robin Hood?
- Is the Co-op a commie-run store?
- Is VAT a kinda tax?
- Eating a chapati? … Isn’t chapati French for hat?
- Rouge? … Don’t you mean blusher?
- Is an Alsatian a German Shepherd?
- What’s a Rasta?
Send info back soonest,
Yours eagerly, your old buddy
HamishPS. Mum’s in the Betty Ford Clinic. She’s doin’ OK, they’ve cured everything but the kleptomania.
Leicester
February 1st 1985
Dear Hamish,
Thanks for your long letter but please try to put postage stamps on the envelope next time you write. You are rich and I am poor; I cannot afford to subsidize your scribblings. You owe me twenty-six pence. Please send it immediately.
I am not so desperate about my complexion that I have to resort to covering my face with purée of frog. In fact, Hamish, I was repelled and disgusted by your advice, and anyway my mother hasn’t got a blender. She has stopped cooking entirely. My father and I forage for ourselves as best we can. I’m pleased that you enjoyed reading my diary even though many of the references were unfamiliar to you. I am enclosing a glossary for your edification.
- RSPCA stands for: the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.
- Malcolm Muggeridge: is an old intellectual who is always on TV. A bit like Gore Vidal, only more wrinkles.
- PE shorts: running shorts as worn in Physical Education.
- Yes, the Morning Star is a communist newspaper.
- Skegness is a proletarian sea-side resort. Skegness rock is tubular candy.
- ‘V’ sign: it means … get stuffed!
- Toad in the hole: a batter pudding containing sausages.
- Woodbines: small, lethally strong cigarettes.
- Family Allowance: a small government payment made to parents of all children.
- Kevin Keegan: a genius footballer now retired.
- Barclaycard: plastic credit card.
- Yorkshire Puddings: batter puddings minus sausages.
- Broadcasting House: headquarters of the BBC.
- Work it out for yourself.
- Mars Bars: yes, it’s candy, and very satisfying it is too.
- Sainsbury’s: is where teachers, vicars and suchlike do their food shopping.
- PDSA: People’s Dispensary for Sick Animals. A place where poor people take their ill animals.
- GCEs are exams.
- Big and Bouncy: a copy is on its way to you. Hide it from your mum.
- Bovril: is a nourishing meat extract drink.
- Evergreens: a club for wrinklies over 65 years.
- Social Services: government agency to help the unfortunate, the unlucky, and the poor.
- Spotted Dick: is a suet pudding containing sultanas. I find your sexual innuendoes about my favourite pudding offensive in the extreme.
- Detention Centre: jail for teenagers.
- Black Magic: dark chocolates.
- Sheffield: refer to map.
- Habitat: store selling cheap, fashionable furniture.
- Radio Four: BBC-run channel, bringing culture, news and art to Britain’s listening masses.
- ‘O’ level: see GCEs.
- Copper’s nark: rat fink who gives the police information about criminal activity.
- Noddy: fictional figure from childhood. I hate his guts.
- Dole: Social Security: yes, it’s Welfare.
- Sir Edmund Hillary: first bloke to climb Everest.
- Alma Cogan: singer, now alas dead.
- Lucozade: non-alcoholic drink. Invalids guzzle it.
- Conker: round shiny brown nut. The fruit of the horse chestnut. British children thread string through them, and then engage in combat by smashing one conker against another. The kid whose conker gets smashed loses.
- AWOL: British Army expression. It means absent without leave.
- Noel Coward: wit, singer, playwright, actor, songwriter. Ask your mother, she probably knew him.
- BUPA: private medicine, a bit like the Blue Cross.
- Wellingtons: rubber boots. The Queen wears them.
- Tony Benn: an ex-aristocrat, now a fervent Socialist politician.
- Petrol: OK … OK … gas.
- The Archers: a radio serial about English country-folk.
- The Co-op: a grocery chain run on Socialist principles.
- VAT: a tax. The scourge of small businesses.
- Chapati: not a French hat. It’s a flat Indian bread!
- Rouge: you can call it blusher if you like. I call it rouge.
- Alsatian: yes, also called German Shepherd, terrifying whatever they’re called.
- Rasta: a member of the Rastafarian religion. Members are usually black. Wear their hair in dreadlocks (plaits) and smoke illegal substances. They have complicated handshakes.
Look Hamish, I’m at the end of my patience now. If there is anything else you cannot understand please refer to the reference books. Ask your mother or any passing Anglophile. And please! … please! … send my diaries back. I would hate them to fall into unfriendly, possibly commercial hands. I am afraid of blackmail; as you know my diaries are full of sex and scandal. Please for the sake of our continuing friendship … send my diaries back!
I remain, Hamish,
Your trusting, humble and obedient servant and friend,
A. Mole
Leicester
February 14th
Dear Mr Tydeman,
I am sending you, as requested, my latest poem. Please write back by return of post if you wish to broadcast the said poem. Our telephone has been disconnected (again).
A. Mole