A point of clarification to begin with. Lanchester’s book has nothing directly to do with Das Capital, though indirectly it could be argued it has everything in common with that mighty nineteenth century tome. The Capital being referred to here by Lanchester is our very own capital city, dear old London Town, and despite reading some rather luke-warm reviews, I actually consider this a minor classic in its own right. Lanchester has conjured up a fictitious street in South London and then proceeds to follow the lives of its inhabitants through their various trials and tribulations, and by some clever plot devices links all the key characters together creating a compelling tension throughout.

Lanchester offers us some twenty central characters and then at least another twenty or so minor ones, and for me, every one of these characters rings true. That is some achievement in itself. The dialogue is matter of fact-ish but highly convincing and through these characters Lanchester is able to make dozens of very perceptive observations both about London in particular and human nature in general. But it is the development of the underlying theme of winners and losers in our much heralded global city that is Lanchester’s real achievement, a territory that has not been so successfully explored since Zadie Smith’s towering White Teeth some twelve years earlier.

The most depressing thing about the mainstream media presentation of London is its shallowness. It is only when things come to the boil as in last year’s riots that the cringing journalists at the BBC and ITV are forced to scratch below the surface. Yes, we expect our millionaire, old Etonian politicians to keep up the pretence that all is rosy in the garden, but you might hope that somewhere along the line, some of our grossly over-paid journos might bother to explore the mountains of real tensions that exist on a daily basis in London, as they do in all large urban conurbations. Those sickly-sweet regional slots after the main national news service are so devoid of investigative journalism as to be totally worthless. In fact, they are less than worthless because they paint a false picture of harmony and humanity where in actual fact there are no end of social and economic brutalities existing side by side with great corporate wealth and individual avarice. This is where Lanchester’s novel is so relevant, so contemporary, so telling.

At the one pole of this novel are the extremely wealthy City traders whose mind-set Lanchester seems to have particular insight into, and at the other pole are the migrants and asylum seekers whose often desperate circumstances are either demonised or all but ignored by the media, especially the rabid tabloid press. In between these two poles Lanchester offers us ailing pensioners, young African footballers, arty self-obsessed middle-class wannabes, a typical Muslim family, who in reality turns out to be anything but typical, and of course the forces of law and order the officers of the Met, MI5 and Immigration. When I first read the reviews of Capital I feared the whole thing would be a little contrived but I’m pleased to report that it is, for the most part, anything but. For a taster, just enjoy the following passage where Lanchester describes the self absorbed mentality of City traders, those so called Masters of the Universe who so recently very nearly brought the entire global financial system crashing down to its knees.

Eric was the most tremendous yob, no question. He had that absolute certainty of being right about everything which often came with having made a lot of money in the City. Because every trade involved a winner and a loser, making a great deal of money through trading involved being proved repeatedly right, time after time. That had an effect on people who for the most part had not been shy or unconfident in the first place. They tended to think, genuinely and sincerely that they were the next-best thing to God. Given that, it was interesting the way people with new money copied the people with old money; interesting that Eric, instead of thinking of things he might like to do for himself, now did all the things other people with money did, like go shooting and own yachts. He even sponsored charities, not out of charitable feeling Roger was well placed to know that he had not an atom of charitable feeling of any kind, not for anybody but because it was what you did if you were that rich.

I know of a few people that fit that description perfectly. Interesting that very recently, a high-flyer at Goldman Sachs felt the need to resign because he claimed the atmosphere and culture within the organisation had become so toxic. That of course is not the exception but the general rule of all capitalist corporations no matter how well meaning or charitable their leading officers might feign to be. Be ruthless or be consumed by the opposition that, of course, is the essence of monopoly capitalism. I suspect Lanchester is well aware of this fundamental truth.

If Lanchester is well equipped to describe the City mentality including the wives and girlfriends of the once mighty and untouchable traders, he is equally perceptive in exploring the world of the immigrant, the economic migrant and the pitifully brutal world of the asylum seeker. By the astute juxtaposition of some of London’s winners and losers, Lanchester’s Capital is a hard-hitting novel of our times.

In my well overdue retirement from table tennis management I now have time to ply my trade as a community table tennis coach, this time around in one of London’s most affluent boroughs. And what an experience that has proved to be. All within a stones throw of each other are some of the most wealthy and some of the most deprived neighbourhoods in London. Talk about a north-south divide! These two diametrically opposed communities literally abut each other with no more than a street separating them. Perhaps someone should follow in Lanchester’s footsteps and write a novel highlighting those crippling discrepancies between the impoverished north and the obscenely affluent south. And of course the hugely differing life chances of the children in the borough are confirmed, or should I say reconfirmed, as soon as they enter the school system. Lanchester’s single London street is really a microcosm of London generally a city where life chances are anything but equal.

The one area where London’s children might be considered to have a level playing field is in the sporting domain, but even that is something of a false premise. Things may start off on a relatively level playing field but money and contacts soon make themselves felt. Those parents with a large disposable income will soon push their youngsters forward by use of private coaching sessions and good equipment. Even the ability to get your kids to fixtures and tournaments relies heavily on having the time and money to play the system. Tennis, squash and badminton are notorious in this respect, and even my beloved ping pong, although the most egalitarian of the racket sports, is still dominated, at the elite levels, by those children whose parents are relatively well off. Class invariably makes itself felt, in sport as it does in education, employment and careers.

Lanchester’s book raises another critical questions about our capital city, albeit implicitly. What type of London do we want to live in? Do we want a city blighted by ever expanding airports that put some very dubious business interests above the quality of life of millions in its inhabitants? Do we want a city that is demographically and socially engineered so that those on low or no income are forced to sell up and move either to the fringes of the city or out of the London area altogether? Do we want a city where only obscenely rich gangsters from across the planet can afford to buy property in central London? And most topical of all, do we wish London to remain a giant unregulated tax haven where the world’s dirty money is laundered by the City Of London while the impoverished citizenry sink ever further into debt. London, like any giant global metropolitan melting pot, is not perfect never has been and likely never will be. But it can either get better or it can get worse. Lanchester’s tale seems to pose that question at every page.

Lanchester obviously has much experience of the financial world, he recently produced a book entitled, Whoops!: Why everyone owes everyone and no one can pay, his take on the current global financial crisis. Sounds like a book we should all get our hands on. But there are only so many factual accounts of the global meltdown that can be usefully consumed. Even if we don’t grasp the full intricacies of the meltdown complete with all its derivative tradings, maniacal expansion of credit and criminal debt leverage, most of us get the broad parameters of the thing unregulated casino capitalism that finally placed one too many dodgy bets. But by using the medium of the novel, Lanchester leaves a much deeper impression with his readers, spelling out the human dimensions of corporate greed, or at least how it plays out on the streets of London. A five star read in every respect.

And when you have finished the book you quickly realise that the story has indeed much to do with Marx’s Capital, not only for its explanations of economic crises but in describing the dehumanising and alienating effects of capitalism’s relentless thirst for profit, and that Lanchester has been quite deliberate in his choice of title.