When his wife, Michelle, leaves him for another man, taking their son along too, cabbie Dave Rudman falls to pieces. Fuelled by psychotic mania, he writes a book – a sort of hate-diary in which personal history, professional arcana and bigoted rants ramblingly commingle. Dave buries this ‘rich brocade of parable, chiasmus and homily’ in the garden of his wife’s new house – a posh gaff in Hampstead – where, hundreds of years in the future, when most of England has been destroyed by flooding, it is discovered by a small tribe called the Hamsters. (They live on what used to be Hampstead Heath, now the Isle of Ham.)
The Hamsters, who mostly speak in Mokni – standard greeting: ‘Ware2, guv?’ – treat the book as a holy text and believe Dave to be a god ‘who sees all of us in his rear-view mirror’. Dave’s rules are strictly adhered to: mummies and daddies live apart but split the childcare 50/50 (though actually, female ‘opares’ look after the kids during ‘daddytime’); days are measured in ‘tariffs’; and everyone lives in fear of the PCO (Public Carriage Office), whose spies or ‘seeseeteeveemen’ are everywhere, and which breaks on the wheel those it deems to have insufficient Knowledge.
It’s incredible to think there was a time when Will Self was patronised as a poor man’s Martin Amis. Amis would kill to have written ‘The Book of Dave’, which is dazzling on so many levels, it’s hard to keep track. We’re shuttled in alternating chapters between Dave’s present and the Hamsters’ future, and there is a temptation to hurry through the Ham sections, which take some deciphering, in search of the next hilarious Dave instalment. But readers should resist lest they miss the gags lodged deep within the nexus of cross-referencing.
Control is a quality Self has had to learn: previous books have sometimes felt undone by their author’s sheer facility, as if Self believed his main duty as a novelist was simply to get the stuff down on the page. But ‘The Book of Dave’ is considered as well as impassioned, kind as well as cruel. Black cabbies are easy to caricature, and Self’s achievement here, amid the satirical fireworks, is to make Dave not only human but capable of redemption. The result is one of the finest and funniest London novels in years.
Will Self reads from, talks about, and signs copies of 'The Book Of Dave' at UCL Bloomsbury Theatre on June 8.
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4 comments
Black Cab (Hackney Carriage) drivers in London are often referred to as Black Cabbies, as correctly referred to by the reviewer, and this is indeed a reference to the traditional colour of the cab not the driver.
Comparisons will always be made to Burgess and Amis of whom Will Self is reported to be an admirer. But he could just as easily be compared to Golding. What is clear is that he stands head and shoulders above anything else out there and this book goes a long way to confirm that conclusively.
It is clear after reading The Book of Dave that he is a undoubtedly a great British writer in his own right (some of us never doubted this). The problem now is how the British literary establishment is going to contuinue to live, with such a potent creative force in their midst, without extinguishing the very spark that lights the flame that ignites the fireworks that we hope will keep thrilling us for years to come.
It is the cab that is black and not Dave. I found the Mokni more difficult than Nadsat, Burgess is more explanatory than Self, but I enjoyed the fact that some of the words have to be said out loud to actually understand them.
Black Cabbies are the nickname for the Hackney cabs, NOT the actual drivers!!!
I just read the Book Of Dave and found it immensley readable in spite of the Mokni. I didn't realise there was a glossary until the end but it was very satisfying to work it out - a lot like reading "A Clockwork Orange" and finally having nadsat click in.
I'm curious to know why your reviewer thought Dave was black though?