Recently some of my chunked up time has been spent in the 1980′s. Not literal time travel of course, although that idea does appeal. Ian R Macleod has a wonderful story called Marnie where the protagonist repeatedly goes back in time to prevent a terrible personal tragedy – in it there is a moment when the traveller wakes up and through inference – feeling the subtle changes as he awakes, he realises that he is somewhere in the past. I always wondered what that would be like – if I woke in 1996 would it feel instantly different or would I have to go further back to get that instant dislocation..the fizz and the fizzle and pop of arrival. the 1980′s maybe – the air kinda of all plasticy broken up with the a nylon like static. And what would waking up in medieval times be like – I have always loved the phrase the ‘ the air was medieval’ but have neither found a use for it nor really understand what it could mean.
My own time travel back to the 80′s has come through reading The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst a book so beautifully written that you can’t help but read an enormous message into the whole thing – when it might quite well mean very little at all, just lots of lovely words. So humour me while I continue – to me it was about a lot of things, Class, Money, Greed, Drugs, Other, people’s family but two things loomed rather larger than others – Being Gay and Aids.
Now the Gay part I don’t think was done too well. I am straight myself just like I am English and Tall, and Blue eyed- all accidental a product of circumstances or genes – nothing to be ashamed of nor nothing to be really proud off either. Not down to me.
But I should suppose that being Gay would be more exciting than this – more a great big jumping off – more the moment hanging in the air, more a great big blue thumprint over the world -more well more more, colours and lights and noise and more than I could ever imagine, something else.
But what was more interesting for me was how it talked about AIDS .
For me Aids has always been something that has happened somewhere else. (Now I guess your opinion of me has lowered even more than before), but let me explain growing up in the 80′s it seemed just like another way of hammering us down – along with the impending Nuclear War, Mass Unemployment and Spandau Ballet. I remember one TV discussion telling us that at least a third of all our friends would have AIDS by 1992. It’s a bit like today ; global warming, the war on terror, the pensions crisis – all the things that never happen.
But what I learnt from the Line of Beauty was that these things did happen and they happened here. In the 1980′s a quiet plague – an unspoken holculaust wiped out a generation of gay men in the UK. And I never knew it happened..I must be dumb even some of my favourite songs told me so :
The Pet Shop Boys in Being Boring spoke of :
“All the people I was kissing
Some are here and some are missing”
Kitchen of Distinction a great lost band in Prize spoke of “The pub is burning down”.
I just didn’t get it at the time. But now because of a book, my perspective has changed which is no bad thing at all.
