For a while, at school, we read a lot of fiction by writers who were from the north of England, like us. Looking back, it seems inspired to try to introduce teenagers to literature through writing that reflects the landscapes and voices they know best, and I still love a lot of the writers I discovered then, but I enjoy this story especially because I’ve run on and off for most of my life, and its descriptions of the physical and psychological effects of running are some of the best I’ve ever read.
The story is narrated by Smith, a teenage boy who’s been sent to Borstal for theft, but is given an unusual freedom: he’s allowed out three mornings a week so he can practise for the inter-Borstal race the institution’s governor is sure he can win. It’s cold and uncomfortable to set out at 5 am, but he finds that he can think on these runs in a way he can’t at any other time.
His clarity of thought gives him power; he clearly articulates the lack of hope and opportunity in his life and his awareness that he will never be a winner in the system valued by the governor and the kinds of people who watch the race. He does, however, understand that the governor intends to use his almost certain success in the race to bolster his own career, and as he runs, he forms a plan to get his revenge.
The narrator’s description of reaching a stage where he forgets he’s running and is barely aware of his body moving, or the landscape passing and reaches a meditative state where his thoughts are unexpectedly clear and his feelings more powerful resonates with me, and his account of the final race, where the memory of finding his father’s dead body unexpectedly resurfaces and he realises that he can’t control his thoughts while he’s running is deeply emotional, though characteristically understated.
In The Loneliness of the Long-Distance Runner, W. H. Allen & Co., 1958. Read online here
