Uncle Samson by Beverley Nichols

I was looking through my Beverley Nichols books, trying to decide which one to read next – and only one of them was eligible for Project Names. And so that’s the one I chose! Step forward Uncle Samson (1950), which I hadn’t even heard of until I found it in an extremely disorganised bookshop in Cheltenham earlier in the year.

Apparently it is a sequel of sorts to the excellently-titled The Star-spangled Manner and, like that former book (which I have not read), it is Nichols’ impression of America. And those impressions are certainly varied and interesting!

America is, of course, an enormous country. Nichols can’t hope to encapsulate everything there is to say about it, or even a hundredth – but the selection of chapters he writes are certainly fascinating. It’s worth starting by saying that this is not primarily a funny book. Nichols is a delightful humorist, but in Uncle Samson he is much more in journalistic mode. Which isn’t to say that there isn’t the odd moment of levity in his phrasing. I particularly enjoyed this, from when he goes to visit a funeral home of the sort that Evelyn Waugh pastiches in The Loved One:

It would obviously be impossible to encompass all these attractions without exhaustion, so I contented myself with a brief visit to Lullaby Land, and then went on to the “Mysteries of Life” garden, containing a large statue by Ernest Gazzeri, which suggested that though the sculptor might have known a lot about the mysteries of life he knew little about the mysteries of anatomy.

A glance at the American death industry comes after sections on religious cults, including a notable one led by Father Divine (I had to Wikipedia it, but it’s definitely interesting!) and on the horrors of socialism.

The most animated Nichols gets is the section on race. While many of Nichols’ views were not particularly progressive for 1940s/1950s England (particularly as regards class), he was certainly ahead of the curve on racism compared to the lawmakers of 1940s/1950s America.

Every year 30,000 light-skinned [African-Americans] “crossed the colour-line” and began a new life as whites. If we were told that every year 30,000 Americans broke the barbed wire of concentration camps and regained their freedom we might sit up and take notice, for America is a great democracy and does not incarcerate her citizens unless they have committed a crime. Yet America runs the greatest concentration camp the world has ever seen, and the only offence of its occupants is the crime of having been born.

I think he writes more about race than anything else, and he is baffled and angry about it – recounting his own embarrassment that he hadn’t considered the obstacles that would be in the way when he tries to meet up with a black friend. America still has a terrible problem with racism, and a President who is openly racist without seeming to suffer from his voting base – but Uncle Samson does remind us that at least some progress has been made. And I’d have written a rather more hopeful sentence there under the previous President, as opposed to the one who thinks black American women should “go home”.

Let’s move onto cheerier things. He meets Walt Disney! That is rather an enchanting chapter. I don’t know how accurate it is as an overall portrait of Disney, but Nichols certainly seemed won over by him – particularly his childlike enthusiasm for Fantasia – and tells of employees who are similarly devoted. I hadn’t expected an interview with Disney when I started reading Nichols’ work, but why not?

Another surprise, and a fascinating section, is Nichols visiting Alcoholics Anonymous – as an observer rather than a participant. He writes glowingly about what a wonderful initiative it is, and wishes that something similar existed in the UK.

What a curious and beguiling set of topics Nichols addresses! It’s interesting to compare this with modern-day America, and the topics that Nichols would write about now. Race and the movies would both still be there. Funeral homes probably wouldn’t (while guns and the lack of a national health system certainly would). Some things have changed a lot and some things don’t seem to have changed at all.

I was a little disappointed when I started and it wasn’t a comic work, but I was quickly won over. It doesn’t rank up there with Merry Hall, but it’s very good in a different mood. Nichols is a great journalist/essayist – nothing here pretends to be objective, and it’s all the better for it. For a very singular trip to mid-century America, track down a copy now.