Letter

Someone came into the shop a few months ago and we were talking, as one does, about climate change and I said that we had ten years to sort ourselves out. They looked at me as if I was barking, or at least as if my only motive was to try and sell The Hopkins Manuscript. I wish I had been barking, but the Stern Review today makes it clear that global warning has become the reality many of us were dreading.

Because I felt that the only possible item with which to start today’s letter was the issue of climate change, we went and bought the papers, well the four ‘quality’ ones, and were rather amazed by what we found. Unsurprisingly, the Guardian’s headline was about the Stern Review, and, alas, ‘Washington sceptical as landmark report warns of economic disaster’. And the Daily Telegraph, responsibly, led on the report and addressed the economic issues of climate change both from the broader perspective (it poses a threat larger than the two world wars and the Depression combined)) and the personal one (new taxes on cars, fuel, etc.). Surprisingly, the Independent did not lead on global warming, however, it has done so often before and undoubtedly will tomorrow when Stern has presented his report; The Times, more shockingly, led on house prices!

So I begin to feel a bit like Mr Hopkins after the second meeting of the British Lunar Society, with a crucial difference – they knew by then that the moon was going to crash into the earth, we still have ten years before the tipping point arrives. But, as everyone is saying, why doesn’t the government do something major (turning off the lights in government buildings at night, not going on foreign holidays), anything so that we can feel something is being done? Or have a Three-Day Week, indeed, as in the 1970s? Did we mind having meals by candlelight and only running the washing machine every other day? We certainly did not.

Oh dear, this Letter, which we were determined should not be an opinionated rant, has nearly become one. But this is only because the issue of global warming is too crucial to ignore, and it’s very difficult to make one’s tone of voice less heated.

So apart from that, Mrs Lincoln... Well, Emily was yet again in the office on her own last week while I was finishing my book (yes, it is finished, hurrah). And as the afternoons get darker, we are taking a breath before the busiest month of the year. The new Quarterly and Catalogue start to go out early next week, so that most of you should have it by mid-November; and even though that’s only five weeks before Christmas, we find that the books still (almost invariably) get there within two or three days in the UK and within five days abroad (by airmail).

There were two interesting pieces in the Guardian recently, one about the regeneration of Bloomsbury’s Brunswick Centre and one about which texts are chosen for the A level English syllabus. If anyone can suggest how we can at least propose William – an Englishman or Fidelity or The Wise Virgins or The World that was Ours as A-Level texts, please let us know.

Finally, do look at ‘Sceptical Cook’, a blog about cooking by Nicholas Clee: he received an advance copy of Plats du Jour (he’s a journalist!) and was inspired to make Soupa Avgolemono. And also take a look at an interesting piece about Greenery Street on ‘Velvet Empire’.

When this picture appeared on the cover of the Quarterly a few winters ago, many of you asked if we could do it as a poster. Well, now those of you with colour printers can print it off. The photograph was taken in Sicilian Avenue, off Southampton Row, five minutes away from Lamb’s Conduit Street.

Click on the image to open a larger version of this photograph (1mb)

Nicola Beauman
30 October 2006
Lamb’s Conduit Street