I would have to echo the recommendation of an earlier reviewer, who pointed out that each story is really it's own novella. Considering the three pieces to be part of a single narrative arc might leave one feeling unsatisfied; on their own, each novella is startling, brisk, and eye-opening. ( )

Three 'long' stories.

Although this book should fall within my chosen genres it totally failed to grab me.
It narrated a series of three fictionalised tales of coloured men who had lived in the UK, two during the last century and one in the eighteenth century.
I found it unnecessarily drawn out and wordy and I only finished it because it was an audiobook. Even this was not a great selling point, as the last story, about David Oluwale, a Nigerian stowaway who arrived in Leeds in 1949 and who triggered an awareness of the treatment of immigrants, seems hypocritical, as the main narrator was American, criticising the British police force when his country's history of treatment of couloureds included the Klu Klux Clan.

The opening story was about a servant who worked for the writer Samuel Johnson and was treated well, but who couldn't cope once Johnson died.
The second was the tale of Randolph Turpin, Britain’s first black world-champion boxer, who ended his life with debts and disillusionment.

There was far too much detail, which can be skipped when reading but which is laboriously narrated in an audiobook. An example is the list of 14 prison terms served by David Oluwale, dates, offenses and duration.
From reading other reviews, I sense that this is not Caryl Phillip's best work, so I may give another of his books a try in the future. ( )

Foreigners is a novel constructed of three stories, each about a Black man who migrated to England, each of them in different circumstances and in different times. First is Francis Barber, a slave given to the writer Samuel Johnson in the 18th century. This story is narrated by a caring colleague of Johnson's who compassionately observes Barber at his master's funeral but rationalizes his failure to reach out to the now freed but unrooted "immigrant." He seeks out Barber many years later and describes the man's attempt to build an honorable life in the face of social isolation, marginalization, and neglect.

The second story is that of Randolph Turpin, the son of an immigrant from British Guiana who defeats middleweight champion Sugar ray Reynolds in the boxing ring in 1951. Turpin's own status as champion is short-lived and this story, which especially reads like non-fiction (they all do, but in differing voices), again illustrates the challenge of a Black man making it in England. Social isolation, marginalization, neglect ---- yep, they collude to undermine his ability to break out of the one-dimensional mold established for the boxer by privileged society.

Finally, the third story is of a young immigrant (stowaway) from Nigeria and his too-short life in Leeds in the 1950s. A target of abusive and degrading "entertainment" by local police officers, David Oluwale is found dead in a river and "Northern Lights" reads like a series of reports or interviews by anonymous citizens who knew him while he was living rough in the streets of Leeds. We are also provided excerpts from the trial of the two police officers charged with manslaughter in David's death.

I think this is an excellent novel with its dispassionate and paradoxically emotional exploration of being "other," of being a "foreigner" living on the margins of society. Phillips considers the different manner in which each of these men tries to cope with their situation, which can be and is considered by some to amount to their own contributions to their tragic endings. Whether they try to assimilate and adapt, or fight, or passively allow their detractors to abuse and torment them, the ending is basically the same. White society sees the men in unidimensional, stereotyped say; no behavioral route on their part will change the story.

It sounds depressing and, in fact, it is. It's also a beautifully narrated story with tremendous depth for a reader who's willing to go there. ( )

Caryl Phillips writes with great power and beauty. Many of his books create a world in which the familiar becomes unfamiliar, as Phillips often writes from the point of view of new immigrants. Caryl Phillips latest work, "Foreigners: Three English Lives", combines three separate tales of black men in Great Britain. All three characters are based on actual individuals whose biographies are mixed by Philips with invented narration and moment.

The first novella concerns Francis Barber who found himself in an awkward place as both servant and friend to the 18th century English intellectual Dr. Johnson - who is best remembered as the originator of the dictionary. The second novella brings us up to the 1950's as we consider boxer Randy Turpin and his surprising defeat of the champion Sugar Ray Robinson for boxing's middleweight title in a fierce match in 1951. The third novella tracks, through multiple viewpoints and voices, the death of David Oluwale at the hands of the British police in 1968.

Caryl Phillips, by combining three disparate experiences of black men in Britain, forces us to break free from our stereotypes and look at Barber, Turpin and Oluwale as individuals. The three men are united by the color of their skin and the prejudices they experienced, but their separate and precious lives stand out as jewels on velvet. Highly recommended. ( )

Foreigners by Caryl Phillips is a collection of 3 long short stories which are fictionalized accounts of real people. All three deal with black men displaced in England. In the first story, the language is over-the-top stuffy, but even though it was almost ridiculous, it did work for the story. The second story couldn't end fast enough for me - boooring! But I loved the last one. David Oluwale, a 15-year-old Nigerian who stowed away on a ship to get to England for a better education, is mistreated by the police his whole life. He turns up drowned sometime in his mid-30s (I think). The story is told in pieces by various people who knew him, however slightly. Very sad. ( )