Sat­urday used to be a stand­ard work­ing day. Factor­ies deman­ded a 6 day week, And if there was an extra day off to be had on top of a silent Sunday, it would be Saint Monday. Shops opened late on Sat­urdays for these 6 day week work­ers. As first Sat­urday after­noons and then Sat­urday morn­ings became time-off from work, a proper week­end, and the stand­ard work­ing week solid­i­fied into 9 to 5, Sat­urday became spe­cial. Proper leis­ure time. The day for going to the foot­ball, 3pm kick off, final score on telly at 4.45pm, going to the shops, to take the kids to the park, tea on a low green table in front of the fire, cheese on toast. 

In Sat­urday Night and Sunday Morn­ing, (Sil­li­toe, 1960 [1958]), Arthur is proud of work, his speed, his skill on the cap­stan lathe, the secret of his extra fat pay packet, and so he think he’s cock of the pub come Sat­urday night, where he can down the pints, fall down the stairs and still go home with his mar­ried lover Brenda.

He knows Sat­urday night shouldn’t feel like Monday morn­ing. And he knows that Sat­urday night demands the pay back of Sunday morn­ing. Sunday morn­ing is no redemp­tion though, it’s hangover and a sprint out the door before her hus­band comes home, and then per­haps fish­ing trip, these are the coun­ter­bal­ance to the routine of work and pub. 

You may be famil­iar with the idea that the stand­ard 9 to 5, Monday to Fri­day work­ing week is less com­mon than once it was. Shift work, part time work and the need for work­ers to facil­it­ate the con­sump­tion activ­it­ies of those who have a week­end hol­i­day from work are all evid­ence of detra­di­tion­al­isa­tion and flex­ib­il­isa­tion, although there are those who think the level of change is over­stated (Brad­ley et al, 2000: 51–70). But obvi­ously people work on Saturdays. 

I hate work­ing on Sat­urdays. I used to, my first job was in a lean-to make­shift gar­age, where I checked for flaws in new clothes. I was 13. Later, I worked Sat­urdays in a car show­room as the meet and greet girl, and then in a bar. And I liked it some­times, but I can’t work Sat­urdays now. Sundays are dif­fer­ent. A bit of mark­ing, some read­ing, I don’t mind. Sundays are dull any­way. But the myth­o­logy of the Good Sat­urday that I like to live with doesn’t per­mit for this day to let me work. The Good Sat­urday, how­ever, can­not simply be under­stood as leis­ure time, defined as free­dom from work (Parker, 1983). Sat­urday is fest­ival time. Gadamer describes the fest­ival as autonom­ous time, time which has its own rhythm, which exists not to be spent but to be exper­i­enced. Fest­ival time is not unpre­dict­able, or free­float­ing, only dif­fer­ent to the tem­por­al­ity of other days. My mani­festo for a Good Sat­urday does not mean ignor­ing the norms of work (routine and oblig­a­tion), but play­ing with them to make sat­urday feel like fest­ival time. 

My mani­festo: the paper, always the same. Break­fast that takes time (this is work). Spon­taneity — though spon­taneity needn’t mean an absence of order. Put­ting things in order (this is work). Being sur­prised. See­ing what hap­pens. A trip out. A pint too early in the day. Not­ing and remark­ing on the absence of work. Let­ting things take longer than they need. These make for an ordin­ary sort of Sat­urday fest­ival. The fest­ival, says Gadamer is a com­munity exper­i­ence (this is why all foot­ball matches should start at 3pm on Sat­urday), but not every­one can share my good Sat­urday, they have to be will­ing to let time stretch without appar­ent end. Who’s free this weekend? 

Ref­er­ences

    Brad­ley, H. Erick­son, M. Steph­en­son, C. and Wil­li­ams, S. (2002) Myths at Work. Polity: Cambridge.
  1. Gadamer, H. G. (1986) The Rel­ev­ance of the Beau­ti­ful and other essays. Trans. Nich­olas Walker. Cam­bridge: Cam­bridge Uni­ver­sity Press. 
  2. Parker, S. (1983) Leis­ure and Work. Lon­don : Allen & Unwin.
  3. Sil­li­toe, A. (1960) Sat­urday Night and Sunday Morn­ing. Pan Books, Ltd, London.