Article: The 50s ... all Biggest, baggy clothes and big surprises.(Features)

Byline: Craig Brown Book of the Week

Family Britain 1951-57 By David Kynaston Bloomsbury [pounds sterling]25 .[pounds sterling]22.50 inc p&p (08451550713) *****

Across the great sweep of history, the Fifties were no more than the day before yesterday. Yet sometimes the day before yesterday is the hardest to see in any sort of perspective. It is a jumble of detail, impossible to get into focus.

We are all inclined to pummel the decade into our own psychological mould. Pessimists who think that Britain is at present going to the dogs look back on it with nostalgia. Optimists who cling to a belief in progress see it as the final deathly wheeze of a ...

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