Sohemian Society

I'm grateful to the Sohemian Society (http://www.sohemians.com/) for putting on a talk about our mysterious Roland Camberton/Henry Cohen last night for several reasons. The first reason was to finally meet Iain Sinclair who wrote the introduction to this edition, who was the speaker. Iain looks remarkably like the man on the cover of Scamp, though presciently painted by John Minton some decades ago. His talk was of great interest, particularly in referring to the cover of Rain on the Pavements where, in the original you can see a group of political demonstrators heading down towards the source of local power, the Hackney Town Hall, but during the recent riots the rioters went up that road to the phone and sports good shops. How times change. Iain also talked about the connections between, the drift from, the East End to Soho by working class Jews leaving their origins in search of something more exciting, citing Bernard Kops in The World is a Wedding and Camberton, who, unusually, returned home to Hackney for his second book. Camberton only published two books but there is evidence of a third completed novel which vanished, as did the author himself.

The second reason is that the Sohemians meet in the Wheatsheaf pub on Rathbone Place, the "Corney Arms" of Scamp where "Angus Sternforth Simms" (in reality the writer Julian MacLaren Ross) held forth and "Panjitawarelam" (in reality the poet and publisher Tambimuttu) looked mystical. Both characters from Scamp were wonderfully brought to life by the actor Terence Frisch, who gave a reading from the book. The Sohemians have a very good lecture programme, and I was keen to meet their organiser David Fogarty and the others. There are further Five Leaves/New London Editions events planned there.

Baron in the news again

Alexander Baron continues to rise. Here's Iain Sinclair on Alaxander Baron on Open Book, for as long as it lasts on Play it again, Sam, while Tribune has included an interview with me, about London books including Baron. The actual Trib page is not on line, but the article appears complete on the magazine's author's blog: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b011tw7z#synopsis, http://benbrill.tumblr.com/post/6182121621/interview-with-ross-bradshaw-five-leaves-publishing

Books of the year

Everyone else does it, so here's ten books I read this year I would recommend... I wouldn't say they were my favourite books of the year (I published those ones) and they are in no particular order. Just ones that come to mind.

Deer Hunting with Jesus: guns, votes, debt and delusions in Redneck America by Joe Bargean (Portobello). Anyone reading this would have known the sub-prime market would collapse. See? One book could have saved the world's economy. Read this and weep. Yup, fucked over, heavily armed, anti-union... this lot will vote Palin for President if they get the chance.

Edward Carpenter: a life of liberty and love by Sheila Rowbotham (Verso). The big biography of the most interesting of sandal wearers, a socialist, a vegetarian, an adult education lecturer, a believer in “dress reform” and feminism who lived in an openly gay relationship near Chesterfield at a time when such things were considered impossible.

Homage to Caledonia: Scotland and the Spanish Civil War by Daniel Gray (Luath). This is the book that told me that in my home town workers took over a knitwear factory to make clothes for Spanish people and ran it as a co-op. Didn't learn that in school.

Every Secret Thing: my family, my country by Gillian Slovo (Virago). A re-read here, in prep for interviewing the author at Lowdham Book Festival. The family in question were Joe Slovo, who became a cabinet member in Mandela's government and Ruth First, assassinated by the apartheid regime.

Who was Sophie? by Celia Robertson (Virago). Celia's search to find out what had happened to “Sophie”, her grandmother, once a poet published by the Hogarth Press, who became a bag lady on the streets of Nottingham.

Cello by Frances Thimann (Pewter Rose). A book of short stories by a new press in Nottingham. Delightful cover, elegiac short stories about old age.

Writers on Islands edited by James Knox Whittett (Iron Press). An anthology by mostly well known writers about the islands around the coast of Britain and Ireland, including Kathleen Jamie, JM Synge, George MacKay Brown and many more. Lots of good short pieces.

Cold Granite by Stuart Macbride (Harper Collins). McBride's first tartan noire book, set in Aberdeen. Mentions many of my old haunts and it is good to know that police still feel unsafe visiting the Fersands estate where I used to live!

The One That Got Away by Zoe Wicomb (The New Press, USA). Internet only for this one for the moment, short stories set in South Africa and Glasgow, mostly with South African characters. One story, “N2” is near perfect.

Hackney, that Rose-Red Empire by Iain Sinclair (Hamish Hamilton, but due out in paperback in February). A rag bag, mishmash, rattle bag of Sinclair's usual concerns featuring a cast of the missing, the eccentric, the fictional, the even more unlikely factual.

There are probably others that would have been top tenners that I've forgotten, loaned out, returned to libraries, misplaced, but this seems a good enough selection. It was a good reading year, despite the misery in the book trade. Five of the ten were written by women and (phew) six were from independent presses.

John Minton

Five Leaves has got the go ahead to re-issue the two Roland Camberton books - Scamp and Rain on the Pavements in our New London Editions series. No date set yet, more details to follow etc. Camberton was one of the great mysteries of London literature, which meant of course that Iain Sinclair got on the case. Sinclair wrote a long piece on Camberton for the Guardian, which will be included in Scamp. We'll be using the original John Minton covers, which will gladden some hearts, and this led me to read Frances Spalding's Dance till the Stars Come Down (the title taken from an Auden poem), Minton's biography. Spalding's book is out of print, and not cheap on the net.

John Minton was a household name in his day, but died young, by his own hand, in 1957. He was part of that Soho set who would hang round The Colony Room and drink too much. Minton was part of the "homosexual freemasonry" (Spalding's phrase) and led a promiscuous life. He knew a sailor when he saw one, that's for sure, yet often fell in love with heterosexual men.

Minton inherited money, and was a successful artist. He supported many who needed his help and many who were spongers. He was never known to turn down a commission - it would be terrific to see an exhibition of all his book covers. As well as Camberton he produced covers for Martin Goff, Alan Ross and the cookery writer Elizabeth David, for John Lehmann and other publishers. A general retrospective would be good too.

Spalding has probably covered everything biographically, but her book is short on illustrations. An illustrated John Minton anyone? I'd buy one.