No Love for Johnnie (novel)

No Love for Johnnie by Wilfred Fienburgh, was first published in 1959 by Huchinson. Essentially a political novel it deals with the life of Johnny Byrne, a cynical and burnt-out politician whose career has ostensibly stalled due to his leftist leanings in a "conservative" Labour government.

Plot introduction

Stylistically the novel belongs to the genre associated with John Osborne, John Braine, Shelagh Delaney and other realist writers who were to find their voices heard in the new wave of British "verismo" art forms. The narrative allows the reader to examine the internal conflicts that Johnnie Byrne negotiates while attempting to find some merit in his desultory existence.

Under scrutiny are his relationships with his cold, politically driven wife, Alice, whose own politics are a point of contention for Johnnie. His neighbour, Mary and the young woman, Pauline illuminate Byrne's darker aspects. As a piece of literature it may be considered light weight but re-readings will reveal a tight structure and a credible analysis of the way powerful individuals, the makers of social change, are paradoxically vulnerable cyphers in a world where they too may be ill-served by cupidity.

Even the weak ending of his relationship with a much younger woman may seem cliched and trite by twenty-first century standards but it is handled with a certain amount of legerdemain and irony so that it escapes being trite. There is a sense that Byrne lands on his feet by his very own inaction in political matters. However, rather than the end might suggest, it is clear that Byrne has failed to influence his own life. He appears to be a pawn at the mercy of events around him.

Major themes

Political success as a result of chance is less desirable than success that has resulted from the manipulation of political advantage. And it is this observation that makes No love for Johnny a more substantial novel than it may first appear.

If nothing else the novel provides a fine picture of English society just prior to its fillip into the swinging London era which made many of the issues that trouble Byrne essentially less problematic.

Literary significance & criticism

Being a political novel opinion is unlikely to be unbiased, however this comment by Alan Lovell in 1961 is quite harsh,

"No Love for Johnnie is a bad novel" .