Skinhead - Richard Allen

SKINHEAD - RICHARD ALLEN

As a certain Welsh skinhead/Oi! band by the name of The Oppressed once informed us: 'He's the king, the king of the skins. What's his name? Joe Hawkins'. And yes, after all these years he still holds the crown. And yes, if by chance you think you've never been introduced to Joe before then you're wrong because I can assure you, you have. Joe's always been with us and probably always will, with the only thing really changing about him being his style of dress. In Richard Allen's classic, pulp fiction book Skinhead, Joe is exactly what it says on the cover and exactly as described in the song named after him: 'See him walking down the street, Doctor Marten's on his feet. Levi jeans, Ben Sherman shirt, fuck with him and you'll get hurt'.

Joe Hawkins is the British folk devil incarnate, as conceptualized by sociologist Stanley Cohen in his book 'Folk Devils And Moral Panics'. He exists in the flesh but also very much so in our minds. In literature, the obvious comparison is with arch-droog Alex, in Anthony Burgess's 'A Clockwork Orange', except that Joe doesn't possess any of Alex's redeeming qualities such as a love for Beethoven or a knack at turning a good phrase in his native argot. No, the only thing that Joe's got going for him is his love of aggro that he sees as the pathway to him being respected. His motto could even be that which Emperor Caligula was fond of espousing: 'Oderint dum metuant', which as any common or garden Latin scholar would know as meaning 'Let them hate me, so long as they fear me'. 

First published in 1970, Skinhead by Richard Allen was a veritable phenomenon that was picked up and read by a huge number of working class kids. More people probably read it, in fact, than copies sold as it was a book that was passed around, particularly in the school playground and from older brother to younger brother. Teachers, of course, hated it due to the themes of mindless violence, racism and misogyny that ran through it. And they were right to - but then teachers were never meant to like it.

It needs to be pointed out, however, that just because Skinhead found a working class readership, it doesn't mean that violence, racism and misogyny are working class values. Far from it, in fact. In the book, Joe Hawkins' own father for example is a London docker who though quite capable of being violent, shows no signs at all of being racist or misogynist. Rather, he's a solid union man who believes in solidarity and the right if need be for 'the working man to withdraw his labour for better pay'. The only violence he actually displays in the book is when he gives Joe a thrashing in a bid to teach him a (rather too little too late) lesson.

Richard Allen on the other hand is the one who's really driving the book but it's difficult to tell where his personal politics might lie. A literary work exists independently of its author's personality, life or intentions and with Allen this was certainly the case, particularly when it was revealed his real name was James Moffat and he was a Canadian hack writer who lived in Devon. In a somewhat tranquil town called Sidmouth on the East Devon coast, in fact, as far removed from the London East End of old and skinhead violence as might be possible.

Popular culture, of which Joe Hawkins and Skinhead were very much a part of at one point can be an unpredictable thing that can often take on a life of its own, not only permeating and seeping into corners of society that other things fail to reach but also emanating and spreading out from those same corners. Which in this case leaves us at the end of the day with a book like Skinhead and its place in both sub-culture and popular culture alike.

Skinhead by Richard Allen may not be the most ideologically sound of books but it's still a fascinating artefact for all kinds of reasons.

John Serpico