In Print Magazine (Book)

POLITICS SOCIETY LIFESTYLE TRAVEL ENTERTAINMENT ART

READING THE WORLD THROUGH BOOKS

£6.00

01

Trusted by over 1 million members

Try Scribd FREE for 30 days to access over 125 million titles without ads or interruptions! Start Free Trial Cancel Anytime.





















IN PRINT

Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst























IN PRINT

IN PRINT EDITOR: Chiara Rimella

Letter from Letter from the Editor

F E A TU R E S E D I TO R : Lou Boyd

DESIGNER: Serina Sandhu

C HI EF S U B E DI T OR : Rachael Pells Pells

PRODUCTION EDITOR: Daniel McCarthy

P I CT U R E E D I TO R : Kitty Knowles

ILLUSTRATORS: Lydia Rose Carter, Carter, Rachel Stott, Ellen Twinem, Twinem, Margherita Mazzola Mazzola

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHER: Pippa Bailey

C O N T R I B U TI N G W R I T E R : Paul Bailey

#In-Print Twitter: @In_PrintMag

When I tried to expla in to my friends who chose “sensible” careers why I picked a degree in English, Engli sh, most of them sniggered. “I bet you only li ke books because you’re you’re rubbish at sports,” sports ,” one of them said. In fa irness, there is a degree of truth in this. You know the last child to be picked in school volleyball teams? I do. Al l the same, I don’t think I’d swap the time I’ve spent laying on my All belly reading readi ng a book for anything else. I could have become an Olympic Skeleton Skeleto n champion, but as it happens I got stuck with Roald Dah l. I might not have the muscles to show for it, but I know a fa ir deal about sports – or fandom fa ndom at least. Who, after reading read ing Fever Pitch, doesn’t? doesn’t? I wouldn’tt say I’m a modern-day Madame Bovary, liv ing out a ctional wouldn’ fantasy, but I do think thi nk that th at Jonathan Coe’s Coe’s novels have something to do with my decision to move to England. Books aren’t just something we “do” with our spare time – they’re a lens through which we look at reality out there there,, they teach people about all sorts of things. Think of a subject – anything. anything. Lizards, parking lots, outer outer space: I bet you there’s a book for that. That’s what we at IN PRINT do. We tell stories about what’s what’s going on in i n the world through the books that  rst opened our eyes to them. Some people dedicate their life li fe to books – we’ve spoken to those who write t hem, make them or sell them. But those of you who at least once have told a friend you were really sorr y but you couldn’t go out that night (only to go back and nish the last 50 pages of your novel) know what “just” loving books means. If you’ve ever had a rush-hour crush based on the book the passenger in front of you was showing off, if you understand that reading a book before watching watching its lm  lm adaptation is not an option but an ethical imperative, if you’ve ever had to hide behind t he pages not to admit you were were actually actuall y crying cryi ng like a baby, if the idea of a literary literary pub crawl genuinely excites you – then you’ll probably understand where we’re coming from when we say that stuff is generally better if it’s been IN PRINT rst.























IN PRINT

6

28

STAFF PICKS

Healing S Y R I A

12 T H I S not T H A T

8

32

L O S T and F F O U N D

LITERARY BOGEYMEN

13 J U D GI N G A BOOKBYITSCOVER

9

36

home S W E E T home

Capitalising on PIKETTY

14

Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst

10

a F U L L Y - F O R M E D winner

#SHELFIES

44 S H O R T for S H O R T

20 11

RESTLESS UKRAINE

reading

46 GASTRO

MARATHON

tomes

24























IN PRINT

48

82

Materialising Materialis ing

Brave new F I L M

MARQUEZ

70 when life gives you L E M O N S

56

86

KAMILA SHAMSIE

V I S U A L I S E this

72 noP O R Tof C A L L

60

88

B O U N D to L A S T

cover

REBOOT

75 G O inP E A C E

63

93

Meet the B O O K S E L L E R

STOCKISTS

76 64

R U I N among R U I N S

95 THANKS

A STORYBOOK ROMANCE

81























IN PRINT

STAFF PICKS Chiara Rimella, Editor

Lou Boyd, Features Editor

Serina Sandhu, Designer

“I have spent half of my conscious life wishing I could write like Raymond Carver. Where I’m Calling From is a collection of 37 stories – his best ones, selected by the author just before his death – and in all its 430 pages, none of the bare, stark sentences are misplaced . Carver’s stories illuminate life with the power of a

“Starting Patrick Hamilton’s Hangover Square

“After a childhood poring over fairy tales, discovering The Picture of Dorian Gray in

ashlight: aggressive, unforgiving and rudely

honest, they scratch at the raw heart of things. I love Carver because he in tur n loves humanity, humanity, despite – or thanks to – his disenchanted view of people. Alcoholics, inadequate fathers, couples that do not know how to speak to each other any more, all nd a legitimate space

in his stories, emerging from a silence that is only apparently painful, and that is, in tr uth, a welcome refuge for characters and readers who know that the shadow of actions always speaks louder.”

Rachael Pells, Chief Sub Editor

at the age of fteen I was instantly enthralled and knew within the rst few pages that this

book was going to change my literary taste from that point onwards. Set in grimey World War II London, Hamilton’s words are full of intense emotion, astute observation and the sting of unrequited love. Against the backdrop of an underpaid, alcoholic city, protagonist George is jealous, schizophrenic and paranoid, but a character with whom it is easy to sympathise and relate. As you are drawn into his morally skewed, unreliable view of the world, his dry and witty tone invades your mind and stays with you long after you’ve closed the pag es. Over the years since I rst discovered Hamilton I’ve fallen

in love with many other authors, yet Hangover Square still inspires and haunts me like me no other novel.”

Daniel McCarthy, Production Editor

“What really affected me about The Collector – even more so than the gruesome descriptions of kidnap and obsession – was the overpowering sense of loneliness depicted between both characters. The story is told alternately between

“City of Night was, for me, the coming of age American novel that everyone needs – a strange cross between On the Road and The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Its subject matter had no relevance – the underworld of male hustling in

Frederick Clegg, buttery collector and City Hall

1960s America lled with drag queens, nights

employee, and his newest possession, Miranda, whom Clegg keeps locked up in a basement.

in all night cinemas and struggling young men – but Rechy’s Rechy’s stream of consciousness style pulled me in like tornado winds, sticking me next to him in Times Square waiting for his next score. Rechy started out writing a letter to a friend about his travels across the country and

Reading the story through his eyes, it is difcult

not to feel pity and even sympathy for a man trapped in a stagnant existance; he is, after all, just an artist with a desire to collect beautiful

my teens was akin to nding the censored

alternative. Fiction verging on make-believe, thought provoking messages about morality and ttingly cruel consequences for the un-good,

Wilde’s classic is a tale for the ages. The fable that Dorian teaches us – yearning for eternal youth and beauty will be the demise of any soul – has scored my mind much like Dorian’s acts of vanity scored his portrait. But it is Wilde’s depiction of decadence in the Gilded Age and language calculated to portray darkness that captivated me most in that rst read. It is those

words, obsessively aesthetic much much like Dorian himself, that I covet in my own writing. And it is those words, woven together with artistry unlike anything written today, that will stay with me forever.”

Kitty Knowles, Picture Editor

“Disturbing to the point that you can’t stop reading, Bret Easton Ellis’ Wall Street nightmare blends dark humour with truly shudder worthy horror. What’s What’s worrying – and I hope I’m not alone in thinking this – is that Patrick Bateman’s obsessive attention to branded suits, changing musical genres and ever y exhaustive detail of his detached yuppie lifestyle is so soporic that you’re alarmingly unsurprised as

his violence graduates from kicking a dog, to stabbing a man, to the most genuinely terrifying breed of sexualised torture. Despite its gore,

























IN PRINT

























IN PRINT

@andrewwade1983

@dreadedloon

@enrichardendure

#S H E L F I E S

@littlemissbutcher

As books are having their moment in front of the lens, we asked literary instagrammer @leahdolores to talk about her bookshelf Can you do better? Share your #Shele at @In_PrintMag

What does your book collection look like? I’ve got a few hundred books. They are stacked in quite a hodgepodge way, but they are colour coordinated!

What kind of novels do you nd most appealing? I enjoy science ction and novels set in a different time or place. I think

@cavellucci

that’s because it’s that much easier to escape into the pages and let my imagination run away. away. I also enjoy theory and historical texts.

What book should people read now? Lanark, by Alasdair Gray: following the recent re at the Glasgow School

of Art, which saw the Mackintosh building destroyed, this dystopian dystopian depiction of Glasgow is testament to the enormously varied and awesome talent that has emerged from the school.

If you could exist in any book what book would it be, and why?

@wannyrow

























IN PRINT

r e a d i n g er

MARATHON

Swann’s Way Swann’s Way is the rst part of Marcel Proust’s massive seven-volume novel, In Search of Lost Time. It’s It’s almost 430 pages of Proust’s recalling recalling old memories in dream-like prose. I can nish it in 24 hours, right? That’s not even 20 pages per hour. I can do that.

@LauraloubeeBoyd 11am

After a caffeine and sugar breakfast, I have have somehow managed to get past the halfway mark! I’m fully into the novel’s love story now – I’m half hoping it all goes wrong for them just for some excitement to keep me going. I suspect, however, that this is not going g oing to be an action-packed story. story. @LauraloubeeBoyd @LauraloubeeBo yd 1pm

I’m leaving the book for a few hours and doing some other work to salvage salvage my sanity. sanity. I tell myself that I’ll go back to it in an hour.

What book should Lou marathon-read next? Tweet @In_PrintMag with your nomination @LauraloubeeBoyd 11pm

OK. Here we go. With 24 hours ahead of me, I am feeling pretty optimistic about nishing the book in time – it’ it’ss only the rst volume. I settle down with coffee, fruit pastilles and an emergency energy drink. This is g oing to be ne.

w

@LauraloubeeBoyd 12am @LauraloubeeBoyd I hate Proust. After reading and re-reading the rst few pages,

I’ve accepted that I have no idea what’s going on. I’m also suspicious that no one in this book does, either. The character is sat confused about life, I’m sat confused about the book.

@LauraloubeeBoyd @LauraloubeeBo yd 5pm

Four hours later now, and I’m back to reading. I have decided that a change of surroundings might inspire me. I’m in a coffee shop on my fourth coffee of the day. day. I now have just over a third of the pages still to go, and six hours left. I think it’s time for another coffee. @LauraloubeeBoyd @LauraloubeeBo yd 8pm

There is no way I’ll I’ll make it. It’s been three hours since since I started again and I’ve only read 70 pages. The bottle of wine in the kitchen is looking more and more appealing and I’m wondering if alcohol will increase or hinder my chances chances of completing before my deadline. I decide not to risk it.

























IN PRINT

T H I Snot T H A T The classics are forever heralded but we sometimes forget the author has written other books too. Here, we ght for the literary underdog Tweet Tw eet your #Underdog to @In_PrintMag

Daniel McCarthy’ McCarthy’s s Underdogs

Serina Sandhu’ Sandhu’s s Underdogs

J.D. Salinger

F. Scott Fitzgerald

This: Nine Stories Not: The Catcher in the Rye

The Beautiful and Damned Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst This: Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst Standfrst

Not: The Great Gatsby

Salinger’s only published novel and perhaps the most famous comingof-age novel in American literature, The Catcher in the Rye tells

Fitzgerald’s second book is uninhibited, loosely written and far naughtier in comparison to the straight-edged Great Gatsby. While

the story of anti-hero Holden Cauleld and his battle through the

awed characters are key to Fitzg erald’s novels the characters in The

angst and agony that comes with being a teenager. ’Catcher is now a classroom staple, but the Glass family rivals Holden as the author’s greatest creation. Through eight tales – three of which appear in the collection Nine Stories – Salinger weaves the history of a troubled

Beautiful and Damned are exciting, unlike the sickly-sweet Daisy Buchanan and forlorn Jay Gatsby. Gatsby. Unashamedly sinful pleasure, parties, and gin above all else, Anthony and Gloria are wonderfully wicked. The ending of Gatsby is also somewhat lacking. lacking. Jay is shot,

























IN PRINT

JUDGING A BOOK BY ITS COVER WWhile we don’t condone it, sometimes a judging a book by its cover can really tell you a lot about it

Lou Boyd: Working the shelves

Words: Paul Bailey

9am 1962, Germano Facetti The eye motif sums up the book’s book’s themes of observation and invasion invasion of privacy in the most simple and effective way. way. The funnel of pipes leading to the eye relates closely to a passage in the book when Winston is captured by the party.

Unlocking the shop door I see the usual early morning suspects. The suited businessman, who rushes past me to pick up the new parliamentary biography before work, the eccentric old regular who will, as always, always, pick pick the most obscure obscure title from the history section before settling into a chair and snoring for the rest of the day, day, and the confused looking tourists who clearly thought that London woke up earlier than nine.

11am 1966, William Roberts William Roberts’ Roberts’ painting of a civil defense headquarters could easily pass for the inner workings of one of Orwell’s Ministries. Ministries. However,, the overall aesthetic of the However painting - a brightly coloured, appealing ofce

environmentt - could not be further environmen fur ther away from the bleak, monotone surroundings of Orwell’s novel.

2000, Stephen Conroy It’s impossible not to assume that this Stephen

New titles are delivered. Opening up the box, I see 20 copies of a gigantic sci- hardback. Hauling the

copies across the shop, I attempt to climb up and shelve them at at the top of the large bookshelves. A succession of six heavily bound books insolently fall right back at me, bouncing off my head one by one, as amused customers watch on.

1pm The thirtieth customer of of the day comes over over to ask whether we stock Harry Potter. I grit my teeth and point to the huge display in the children’s section behind them, complete with stuffed owl and broomstick. How has anyone not read Harry



























IN PRINT

a

FULLY-FORMED

wi nner nner

Eimear McBride, winner of this year’s Baileys Women’ Women’ss Prize for Fiction, talks of avoiding Irish sentimentality, sentimentality, raw experiences and how her past has inuenced her debut novel, A Girl is a Half-F Half-Formed ormed Thing.

Interview by: Kitty Knowles



























IN PRINT



























IN PRINT

What drew you to using such strong references to blood, dirt and vomit throughout the novel?

Is there a particular part of the novel that you feel stands out, or is especially important?

I really wanted to avoid any kind of sentimentality. There’s a great danger, especially when writing about themes that

One of the hardest parts for me to write was toward toward the end of the book, when the brother is told that he is going to die. I decided early on that I would make it the sparsest piece of writing and set it out differently to the rest of the book, which is very dense and has all the sentences jammed together. This section, on the other hand, is opened out line by line. I wanted to set it apart from the rest of the book as a moment of clarity clarity..

are so closely identied with Irishness and

Irish writers. By rooting the novel in the physical I hoped it would make it more immediate, and less emotional in a way.

What effect did you hope your distinctive, urgent style would have on readers? I wanted to see if I could give the reader a very different kind of experience. My aim was to try and make the author disappear, so that the text would be an almost unmediated experience between the character and the reader, and so that the reader would feel very closely implicated.

Would you describe your writing as a stream of

consciousness? Did you intend it to be so?

I certainly set out with the idea of writing

“I met a man. I met a man. I let him throw me round the bed. And smoked, me, spliffs and choked my neck until I said I was dead. I met a man who took me for long walks. Long ones in the country. I offer up. I offer up in the hedge. I met a man I met with her. She and me and his friend to bars at night and drink champagne and bought me chips at every teatime.

Can you tell us about your next project? Will you carry on some of the concerns of your debut? It does have some similar themes, but they are looked at from a different angle, and with more distance distance attached to them. them. Also, Also, it’s about two people – so that will be the major difference. It’s mostly through one perspective,, but obviously when there perspective is a lot of interaction between the two



























IN PRINT

BAILEYS AUTHORS RECOMMEND Hannah Kent On writing: Burial Rites I rst heard about Agnes Magnúsdóttir when I was a student living in Iceland. My town wasn’t far from the

site of Iceland’ Iceland’ss last execution and I soon heard about the “murderess” beheaded there in 1830. What sort of person had she been? What social or political circumstances had contributed to her fate? I noticed she was commonly commonly represented as unequivocally unequivocally monstrous: monstrous: I wanted wanted to explore her humanity humanity..

On reading: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Americanah This is the kind of book that – after less than than two pages – you you quickly recognise is everything everything you want in a novel. It’s funny, incisive, scathing, observant and tender by turns. I’ve not recently encountered a book that so brilliantly articulates and challenges western preconceptions about immigrants and race. But to make special mention of the novel’s novel’s treatment of issues is almost a disservice to Americanah’s Americanah’s characters.

Audrey Magee























































CHAPTER ONE





























IN POLITICS

RESTLESS

Anti-semitic propaganda, state-controlled news outlets, imprisonment without trial and a general distrust of the government. Why does the plot of a 1966 Russian novel feel so familiar to the political climate of Eastern Europe today? Words: Rachael Pells





























IN POLITICS

UKRAINE





























IN POLITICS

of mixed untruths which still sit between Russia and its neighbour.

T

*****

he hero of Malamud’s of Malamud’s novel, Bok, is a bitter, apathetic citizen who feels let down by not only the state, but his own people. Having escaped his provincia provincial,l, Jewish town community for a more prosperous life in Kiev, the distrust he feels for almost

Ukrainian people?’ It was quite violent and very humiliating for for him.” A video video of the encounter went viral, and was inevitably used against the Ukrainian Nationalist Party in both western and eastern news. Katerina Kravtsova saw the video from her home in Moscow. “The news in Russia is very state-controlled and of course this video evidence of violent Ukrainians was shown everywhere. I question everything I see because I am a journalist, but the majority of people here believe everything

Violent riots have been raging in eastern Ukraine for months





























IN POLITICS































IN POLITICS





























IN POLITICS





























IN POLITICS

Jacobite cause came came from many many highlanders

advantage”. Other than being associated

“It was a cause and effect relationship relationship,” ,”





























IN POLITICS





























IN POLITICS

A woman walks along a ooded street in Damascus































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































































CHAPTER FOUR

IN PERSON 56

Kamila Shamsie

60

Bound to Last

63

Meet the Bookseller

64

A Storybook Romance























IN PERSON

KAMILA SHAMSIE Unearthing stories from the buried drawer draw erss of the past

I N T ER V I E W: C H I A RA R I M E LL A PHOTO:RACHAEL PELLS























IN PERSON























IN PERSON

K

amila Shamsie stirs the vivid green leaves in her fresh mint tea with the same poised calm with which she speaks. speaks. The 40-year-old’s eyes light up with youth, but her manner demonstrates maturity. As she talks about the horrors of war and imperialist violence that she tackles in her latest book, A God in Every Stone, not once does she lose the composure of a seasoned writer. Opening in 1914, the book traces the interlinked histories histories of Vivian, an English archaeologist, and Qayyum, a recruit of the British Indian Troops who is injured in the Second Battle of Ypr Ypres. es. Both characters take a path that brings them to Peshawar, in Shamsie’s native Pakistan. The book follows their lives until 1930, when the Indian Independence Movement takes centre stage in local history. Years Y ears of research fed into the novel, and it is only by chance that it was released to coincide with the centenary of the First World W orld War. War. “The book book originally started started in 1930; the end section opened the novel. As I was writing it, though, I was interested in understanding what happened to these characters before, so I inserted an earlier part,” Shamsie explains, then laughs:

“I initially thought it was going to be a completely different book, which is how I usually work!”

reection on her sense of nationalisti nationalisticc

duty. “We hear quite often the story of duty. the suffragettes and women going to the factories, and how this changed social dynamics, but I wanted this to be a different story of a woman in war,” war,” says the author. Looking for hidden histories led Shamsie into the uncharted territory of the “forgotten” stories of the First World War: War:

the Indian troops, for example, are often overlooked overlook ed when thinking of the casualties of the war – but more than 70,000 colonial colonial soldiers lost their life in the conict. “It’s

just where my interest spontaneously went,” she says. “Of course as a novelist you’d you’d rather tell stories that haven’t been told a lot of times before.” before.” Her inspiration is often sparked by something she herself doesn’ doesn’tt know much about, and this makes the process of researching all the more exciting. exciting. Like her archaeologist protagonist Viv,, Shamsie dug these stories Viv stories out of the buried drawers of history history.. The whole book

“The novel lives and dies at the level of the individual story”

1918, but very little of the narration takes

revolves around the search for Scylax’s circlet, a Persian artefact, and yet the author claims she was unaware of what appears to be the central, glaring archaeological

place on the battleelds. Most of the action

metaphor of the book until very recently: “I

The rst half of the story spans until

revolves around a Peshawar that is distant didn’t actually think about it until the novel enough from combat to resemble an Edenic came out,” she explains, smiling. “I was at a retreat. Yet the war, far from being just a festival and somebody said: ‘Your book is a pretext, deeply shapes the livses of each of form of excavation in itself’ – that’s when the characters. “Once you take on the war, I thought ‘I’m denitely going to use that!’” you really have to take it on,” Shamsie says. Endless afternoons in the colonial archives archives “If you have characters who are involved involved in of the British Library gave her a proper it, I don’t see how it can’t be a big deal for explorer’ss “excitement of discovery”: explorer’ them and the reader.” unearthing a cover-up in the number of For Qayyum, the war’s effect is victims from the massacre, featured featured at the straightforward: he ghts as a soldier end of the novel, was a genuine satisfaction. and loses an eye, something that both On the other hand, her character’s

























IN PERSON

There is tragedy in one of the characters’ cry, at the end of the book, that history does not matter – and all that counts is the fact people are dying in the violent clashes.

when I go I am aware aware that I’m now at at least half a visitor there.” The compulsion to return to Pakistan Pakistan in her narrative is a mixture of both nostalgia

country I’d been born in had done a better job at being independent.”

And yet, their lives lives are not spent in vain:

and civic duty: “As you might have noticed,

Her novel uses the same ideas.: “I think

their stories are raked up by Shamsie, an optimistic reorganiser of existential chaos. chaos.

has on individuals. And ction can

Pakistan is a particularly messed up place right now, so I think many people are wondering ‘how ‘how did this happen’ happen’ – and for me this question leads to different points in history.” history.” But writing about a land where she does not live anymore often opens her up to harsh criticism on the part of the residents – or at least, the minority

only function through people’s

of Pakistani public public who read in English:

the book problematizes the question of a nation demanding your allegiance because you happen to be a citizen, whether you are born in it or not. I think you should choose a side according to something else.” Her characters follow the parable epitomised by Scylax, the explorer sent by Darius down the course of the river Indus, who ends up turning his back to the emperor he’d sworn loyalty to, and switching allegiance to the side he feels genuinely g enuinely connected to. Qayyum moves past his identity as soldier of the 40th Battalion at Ypres Ypres to become part of the Indian Independence Movement and Viv eventually disavows

F

*****

or Shamsie, history does matter because of the impact it ultimately

stories: “The novel lives and dies at the

level of the individual story,” story,” she explains. Both A God in Every Stone and her previous novel, Burnt Shadows – which earned her an Orange Prize shortlisting and a nomination as one of Granta’s best young novelists – tackle huge g eographical and historical time spans, which are to a much grander scale in her latest stories. She believes she wrote her last two novels in opposition to the rst four, all of which

were set in her native native Karachi. But her work always always returns to the intimacy intimacy of individual characters: characters: “There was a sort of

comfort and familiarity in writing about what I know,” know,” Shamsie Shamsie says, “but “but now the last thing I want to write about is my neighbourhood in Karachi. K arachi.”” Shamsie left her family home in Pakistan after school to study Creative Writing at the University of Massachussets Massachussets,, and gear up towards her ambition to become a writer.

“Because I’m writing about their histories histories,, people feel some ownership of the subject,” she explains. Likewise, her decision to write in English – a forced one for her (“my Urdu isn’tt good enough!”) – has gathered a isn’

“The compulsion to

return to Pakistan in her narrative is a

mixture of nostalgia

and civic duty”

typical brand of neo-colonial “orientalist” “orientalist” criticism: “Some people believe believe that if

you’re writing in English, you’re writing to please someone else’s expectations – which

Being xated on national identity

doesn’t do anybody any favours, she thinks.

both priciples she held at the beginning:

patriarchy and imperialism. Rather than being at someone else’s service, her characters choose to serve a cause they genuinely believe in: an

important switch between a negative and a positive connotation. connotation. “The kind of service when you decide you want to do things because you feel an obligation to the community seems a ne kind kind of service

to me. I think by the end the characters understand what’s to be gained by doing something for another human being.” Shamsie’s book spends its rst half lulling the reader with its hypnotic prose:

but the second half explodes in starker,

























IN PERSON

Mervyn Bailey’s hand taken notes from his bookbinding career

B O U N DtoL A S T Retired bookbinder Mervyn Bailey talks about a profession that was a world away from today’s Kindle generation

Words: Daniel McCarthy

T

he professional bookbinder is a dying breed. As eReaders ood

into bookstores and texts once

his way through the industry, spending time working as a foreman in local local shops. shops. He eventually got work as a regular binder with Manchester University’s library, and then as an entrepreneur working in his own shop. Through his 30-year career, some very old and memorable books have passed through his hands. He has rebound books for the King of Spain and for Buckingham Palace, and his international orders have spread from Canada to Japan.

library or to re-bind older books that had been worn out by years on the shelf. When Bailey moved into his own shop, he would bind family photo albums, private books, or smaller, stranger projects. “Someone

























IN PERSON

Lock up your

libraries if you like;

but there is no gate, no lock, no bolt

that you can set

upon the freedom

























IN PERSON

























IN PERSON

Meeet the M

BOOK SELLER

N AM E : K UR T W IC K AGE:77 B O R N : V I E N N A, A U S T R I A

S E LL I NG S P OT : G R EE N WI C H M A RK E T

I

don’tt have much time to read, but I do have a couple of don’ biographies on the go right now – I nd them fascinating

because you can learn so much about life from others. I’m reading about Marlene Dietrich, the German actress, and JG Ballard, who lived in Shanghai like me. We’ve W e’ve had quite different different lives, lives, Ballard and me me – he came from a very wealthy family and I moved to the Shanghai Jewish ghetto as a refugee in 1939. I was two years old when Mr Hitler made it necessary for my family to escape Vienna. China was the only place we could get into, and it took us weeks to get there by bus bus and boat. The ghetto was a slum, but we were well looked looked after. after. Of course, it was all an adventure adventure for a child. I moved to London when I was 10. When I nished school

I got into handbag manufacturing, like my brother, father and grandfather before me. I made bags for Harrods for 25 years and even have a photograph of the Queen wearing one of my designs. My greatest hobby is books, however however – collecting Jewish books books in particular. particular. I have 20,000 20,000 in my garage at home, home,



























IN PERSON

A STORYBOOK ROMANCE When Carolynn Green starting writing her debut novel, she had no idea that she would fall in love with the dreamy protagonist she had conjured up from her imagination, or that he would have such an effect on her real life. As told to Kitty Knowles



























IN PERSON



























IN PERSON

the time, because I knew people just didn’t get it. But then, if I was them, I doubt I would have have understood either... either... One of the best things about Jack was that he made made me feel sexy again. Honestly,, I cannot explain Honestly e xplain how good he was in bed. There’s nothing too racy racy in the book, though. The sexiest moment has got to be just before they decide to sleep

actually called out the wrong name – but to be honest I think my husband loved it. He was just happy happy that I was so happy happy.. The best time was when when my husband took our daughters away on holiday over Christmas. It was just me and the two dogs and three wonderful weeks with Jack. I could stay up writing until maybe 2am or 3am – it didn’t matter. I didn’t think I was

together again for the rst time: he gets in

being selsh; at that time everyone else just

the shower and she sees him – to me that moment was unbelievable – and then it was

seemed non-existent. I was too absorbed to feel guilty and I felt I’d earned the right to be where I wanted in my life – wherever that was.

like I was taking Jack to bed for the rst

time. It was brilliant. My husband was never jealous: he was always supportive, and even got to reap the benets of my relationship relationship

with Jack in our day-to-day day-to-day life. Writingg with Jack let me be that sexy Writin person I wanted to be – in my fantasies and in real life. I felt condent, I could

A

dress how I wanted, and I would go out a lot more because I just felt so good about myself. It got to the point that when I went to bed with my husband, in my head I was

*****

s my feelings developed it did begin to freak me out. I stopped noticing the distinction between reality and the book. There was one chapter chapter where Jack Jack had to confess that he had been with somebody else, but I couldn’t nish it because I had to



























IN PERSON

times when if y ou ou had said to me, “If you cross over, you can have him’”, I would have. I knew I had to break away from him. After nishing I Promise, I really really pined

for Jack; it was like I was lovesick. I tried so hard to hang on to him, but things that were changing in real life kept pulling pulling me away. My mother was diagnosed with cancer and had to move in with me, my daughter had her rst baby and she needed me. I was

confronted with the reality that Jack simply was not real. There There was nothing that that Jack could do to help me in those situations. It was a very sad time time because I knew I was losing him. On a bad day I can still feel a little resentful towards my family for dragging me away, but on a good day I am very aware that it wasn’t reality and I had to let it go. Maybe it was my family needing me that saved me. I don’t know how far I would have gone, and I am probably lucky that I never had the chance to nd out.

Six months on, I started my second























































CHAPTER FIVE





























IN TRAVEL

when life gives you

LEMONS





























IN TRAVEL

Spain, for better or for worse, over the past thirty years. “I had bought a farm that I would have hardly dared look at over the fence before. In a matter of minutes, I was transformed from an itinerant sheep-shearer and tenant of a tied cottage beneath an airport landing path in Sussex, into the owner of a mountain farm in Andalucía, Andalucía,”” writes

Stewart in his book. Buy a farm in the southern valleys of Spain? Of course you can! Stewart does it and he’s a real person. Sure, the locals won’t

a charming way that all that toil and lack of basic amenities just seems like a bit of a laugh. But the cold-weathered reality is that many Brits who move abroad return home after just a few months months.. A lack of work along with threats from the Spanish government to demolish British-built homes in Spain, helped contribute to the return of over 90,000 ex-patriots to the UK last year. Catriona Hogan, Managing Director of Viva Spain

“I blame Kirsty and

work here, however there there is still a good population of British residents enjoying enjoying the Spanish lifestyle.” lifestyle.” Real estate agents such as Viva anticipate a replenishment replenishment of the community following the dramatic fall in house prices. It may now be more difcult for

the Chris Stewarts of the UK to forge a working lifestyle in Spain, but cheaper housing, a warmer climate and slower pace of life will always attract those of a retiring age to the continent. For my parents, the quest to nd





























IN TRAVEL





























IN TRAVEL

my weekend are similar to those of Antonio Tabucchi’ss protagonist in The Missing Tabucchi’ Missing Head of Damasceno Monteiro. Monteiro. Tabucchi’ Tabucc hi’ss book might might be classied as

a crime story, but there isn’t much mystery or suspense in it – Firmino nds out that

the people responsible for the murder are corrupt policemen pretty early on. But the questioning of social injustice is what’s most important about the novel: how little

men end up quashed by authority and don’t have the voice to speak up. “Grundnorm”, that’s what Don Fernando,, the lawyer who helps Firmino, Fernando

meet him here to show us a cuboid cement structure. “A “A lot of people think it’s a public toilet, but actually until a few years ago it used to be a local library,” he explains. After central government government cut the budget for culture to 0.5 per cent, a lot of similar institutions have have had to bite the dust. “In the ’80s’, Porto used to have 16 cinemas. Now we’ve got two.” This isn’t isn’t too surprising, surprising, really: in lean years, culture is the rst thing to go. But

it’s when we reach the “ilhas” that “The it’s Worst W orst Tours” Tours” reaches its genuine genuine worst. The ilhas are housing housing complexes organised organised































IN TRAVEL

people, many people without a house,” says

Plans to increase the national minimum





























IN TRAVEL





























IN TRAVEL





























IN TRAVEL













































































































































































































































































































































































































In Print Magazine (Book)

Recommend Documents