We & They

Woke up at twenty-past eight. I went into Easterby with Dad where I had a twenty minute wait for the library to open; I took back all my books and although they were overdue, the woman let me off. I got out: We and They by Robert Conquest; On Justifying Democracy by William N. Nelson; Internationalism or Russification by Ivan Dzyuba; Russia After Stalin by Deutscher and Regis Debray’s The Revolution on Trial. I’ll read maybe a couple of chapters of each and I might read the whole of the Debray or Deutscher. I rarely read a book through to the end anyhow. I also bought two books from the library which had been withdrawn from circulation; a book about Amin and one about Kenya and Kenyatta in 1960-61. They might come in handy.

After looking round Smith’s and a couple of shops I ended up at Praxis, where I bought a record (Airto’s Virgin Land) and books (The Marxists by C. Wright Mills; Conor Cruise O’Brien’s Writers and Politics and another Doris L. novel, A Ripple from the Storm). I spent £4.75 total.

The FA Cup Final was on after I got home. I wanted Tottenham to win but they seemed uninterested in the first half and Manchester City’s crunching tackles and frantic running gave them nothing; Spurs kept losing possession and seemed scared to commit themselves. Hutchinson scored with a diving header after 30 minutes. I was frustrated. Spurs started the second half like the first and they were soon piling on pressure. I was really excited and Dad seemed excited too; it was desperate, but the City box was packed and Spurs just couldn’t get past until an Ossie Ardiles run gave Spurs a free kick, Glenn Hoddle’s shot hit Hutchinson’s right shoulder, and deflected past Corrigan for the equaliser. The last quarter of an hour was one of the best soccer matches I’ve seen for ages. In extra time, players were going down like flies with exhaustion, cramp and things, so now it’s a replay on Thursday.