The only certainty is that I come from a set of storytellers and moralists and that neither party cared much for the precise. The storytellers were for ever changing the tale and the moralists tampering with it in order to put it in an edifying light.
V. S. Pritchett, A Cab at the Door
For those of you who have yet to add V. S. Pritchett’s classic memoir to your Slightly Foxed collection, we’re pleased to bring news of our featured autumn read.
The writer V. S. Pritchett’s mother was an irrepressible cockney, his father a reckless, over-optimistic peacock of a man, always embarking on new business ventures which inevitably crashed – hence the ‘cab at the door’ waiting to bear the family quietly away from yet another set of creditors. In this vigorous and original memoir Pritchett captures the smells, sounds and voices of London in the first decades of the 20th century, and the cast of Dickensian characters among whom he grew up.
Please find a link to read Anne Boston’s preface to our handsome SF paperback edition below, as well as further reading recommendations and news of an event in Suffolk next month to celebrate our forthcoming edition of Adrian Bell’s A Countryman’s Winter Notebook. We hope we may see some of you there. Meantime, happy reading to you all.
With best wishes, as ever, from the SF office staff
Jennie, Anna, Hattie, Jess & Iona
Leave a comment