Angry Years: A Literary Chronicle

Colin Wilson's 1956 work The Outsider contributed largely to the popularization of existentialism in Britain and helped earn him the Angry Young Man label. Here he takes us on a journey back to this era, revealing fascinating and sometimes disturbing stories from the greats, including John Osborne, Kingsley Amis, Kenneth Tynan, and John Braine—to name but a few. Historically, the Angry Young Man movement gave birth to the satire movement of the 1960s—Beyond the Fringe, That Was the Week that Was, and Private Eye. Their irreverence aroused enthusiasm, and a new anti-establishment mood developed from Look Back in Anger and The Outsider. The story of that period makes a marvelously lively tale which, most importantly, was recorded by someone who was actually there.