My Alfie Collection

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I've read about half of this book, but what I've read so far is very amusing and very chilling. I gather ALFIE was first a play, then a movie and then a novel, but, inasmuch as the play, the screenplay and the novel were each written by Bill Naughton, I think I may say that ALFIE is, in either of its incarnations, the expression of one artist's view of a particular type of man.

An Evening at Alfies - A leak from the water tank causes problems when Alfie's Mum and Dad are out and the Babysitter has to get her parents round to help. Alfie is 3 or 4, has a 1 year old little sister and they live on a suburban street with their Mum and Dad. The stories feature realistic, everyday scenarios that could happen in the life of any young child. Bill Naughton wrote the screenplay, based on his theatre play some time before. In the same year as the movie’s release, he published the novel. It is very faithful to the film’s narrative, or vice versa, but as a novel and even with the film’s regular breaking of the fourth wall, the book delves slightly deeper into Alfie’s thoughts and musings. Shorter scenes are given length and detail. Idiosyncratic turn of phrases are added which are really quite funny - I don’t think these all appear in the film - and the ending is different but not too much. While not deep in a Jamesian sense or daring in the Joycean, ALFIE is a very good, book-length interior monologue. If a reader gets nothing from it other than a sense of urban British slang in the post-World War Two era, Alfie is a memorable book. But it is, I think, a realistic portrait of a man whose outmoded view of the world keeps him from fully participating in it. He always wants to impose his rules on it, not merely because he is selfish, which he is, but because he has been raised in ignorance of the coming changes. He is corrupt, but that is not what makes him different from others. What makes him different is his awareness that he is despised for his inability to climb socially. People from exactly his class are getting ahead for the first time in many years. He is not going to get ahead. His peers are leaving him behind. Rearing? He means raring. Alfie is not well educated, it must be said. He’s a bit of a barrow boy.)If you ever wanted to know what goes on the mind of a man who treats women badly, just read this. Though it was written in the 1960s, it is still timely for understanding men like Harvey Weinstein. The intimate and uplifting memoir from one of Britain's most loved singers - this is Alfie, off stage. And Alfie is Michael Caine. His is the voice you hear in your head as you read this speedy, funny, sad, piquant swinging London novel. No one else could possibly do. I believe that for any self-respecting geezer, he needs three birds on the go at any one time. Otherwise he may get a little depressed. You may take my word that four is too much. With four mistakes will be made, and there may be consequences. And with only two you could find yourself at a loose end of an evening as they are both otherwise engaged or not in the mood for the hanky panky. Which would never do. So that’s why you need the three. It’s best if two are married like I say and one is a single.

Heder's prose is spare, leaving the reader space to savor the words and appreciate the illustrations. The text doesn't really convey that Alfie was on his adventure for a full year, but the illustrations give clues about the changing seasons, and the birthday balloons with Nia's age give additional hints.

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Dad is, a mite irritatingly, always sitting reading his paper. But, it's a minor gripe. Mostly, everyone looks happy - cheerfully resigned to the mess of early childhood. Alfie Gives a Hand - Alfie gets invited to a birthday party, where the birthday boy is naughty and Alfie comforts a crying girl. Also, I recommend because all in all it is a very readable book. Quirky, at times funny and entertaining by a long shot.

Alfie's Feet - Alfie is taken to the shop to buy Welly Boots, He puts them on himself, but on the wrong feet. They are a little bigger in size than a CD case which seems small, but they are perfect for little hands. Big enough for cosy-ing up close on the sofa for a read, the pictures are big enough to be able to see all the detail, but sometimes you need to look closely (which is fun)Alfie is a turtle - one who disappears. This book, which is really two stories, tells the tale of Nia, who got a turtle for her 6th birtday, and Alfie, the turtle, who went exploring and was gone for a full year. If there’s two things I like to do, then the first thing is having it away with a nice old married bird, they’re so much more grateful than the single ones, I have found, and the second thing is chewing somebody’s ear off about all the interesting observations I have made about life. When I say life, course, I generally mean the old how’s your father and the ways you can get yourself set up just lovely. If you’re a bloke that is. But even if you’re a bird all is not lost. You just have to figure out a few of the basics and you’ll be okay too. But for blokes, this is the way I think it should go. Alfie is a classic unreliable narrator as I learned the term – at school when studying another piece of Northern writing originally designed as drama, Alan Bennett's Talking Heads. He says something and then shortly afterwards contradicts, with words or action his own stated opinion of himself – or rather contradicts the way “most people” would interpret what he said, a sort of unconscious hypocrisy. Sometimes he does it in the same sentence: I don't mean thieving or anything like that, just the odd few bob a day [taken from the till at work]. Alfie Gets in First - Alfie runs in the front door ahead of his Mum and slams the door behind him, causing a minor upset on the street before Alfie manages to open it for himself again.

But this book is also a heartfelt insight to Alfie's unmasked truth for the first time ever. His unflinching honesty reveals not only the success stories, but also the pressures and how, through challenging times, he learned more about himself than he ever thought possible. What's great about this highly entertaining and yet dark novel is that the author passes no judgment on Alfie and people like him. Instead, Alfie's voice reveals all - he justifies his indiscretions by claiming he's actually doing the women a favor, and his rationalizations show just how much of a narcissist he is.

The Alfie Series in Order (23 Books)

Confieso que terminé tomando el libro detonado por la simpática película de Jude Law (que está muy vagamente basada en el texto original), pero en realidad Alfie resultó ser algo más entrañable, vigente y empático de lo que jam��s hubiera esperado. It’s Alfie. Is there anymore to say? I’ve seen the movie a hundred times, the one which made Caine after the role was turned down by more eminent actors due to its controversial protagonist’s promiscuity not because he is a despicable misogynistic self-centred rake. Though there are Alfies about still, this is of its time; you wouldn’t get away with it now - the watered down Jude Law remake proves it. I'd rather literature were seen as a way of understanding our common humanity with dodgy characters without having the unpleasant experiences that knowing some of them might entail; they're not entirely anathema – we probably have things in common with them even if we'd never do the worst things they do. Some of these characters are like manifestations of id - Alfie is a good example of this type - doing things many more people think of than actually do, or things many readers have grown out of. (A long time ago I, similarly, walked out for several hours on someone who was having an operation - someone I shouldn't really have been going out with because I didn't fancy or respect them enough, though I kept trying to persuade myself to because I knew they deserved it. I remember intending to support, then that sudden claustrophobic feeling of Have to get out of here. I've been too much of a rotter myself not to understand those who in turn hurt me.)