Book Review: Looking at London and Paris Sketchbook, by Ronald Searle and Kaye Webb

Looking at London and Paris Sketchbook

On 30th December last year, Ronald Searle, one of my favourite authors and illustrators, passed away at the age of 91. Many of the tributes to Searle mentioned his most famous works, the St Trinian’s and Molesworth series of books. Although both of these series are excellent, I’d like to highlight another couple of books that Searle, and his then-wife Kaye Webb, wrote and illustrated in the 1950s. They are called Paris Sketchbook and Looking at London.

Looking at London is a collection of portraits of ordinary, everyday London characters: lamplighters, railway-workers, bargees, the controllers of Trafalgar Square’s fountains, the keepers of the Kensington silver vaults, and lonely, downtrodden itinerant tradesman, such as John Weston, a 65-year-old ex-cabin-boy turned jobbing gardener. The portraits of these forgotten characters are engaging and charming. To quote from the foreword written by R. J. Cruikshank, “the warm-hearted style of Kaye Webb’s writing and the tender sympathy of Searle’s drawings are beautifully matched. London can be a lonely place, and this book takes the trouble to find out a little more about the faces that pass by every day”.

Paris Sketchbook is a similar work, with Searle and Webb turning their gaze towards the French capital. The subjects of this book are less personal than Looking at London. Instead, Paris Sketchbook is a journal of a husband and wife who, loving Paris, devoted a holiday  to recording some of the people and places they most wanted to remember.

Both books are enchanting snapshots of 1950s life in London and Paris. To the best of my knowledge, neither have been reprinted, but they are sometimes to be found second-hand on Amazon or in second-hand bookshops for about £20. If you are a fan of vintage Searle, and want to go beyond the legacy of St Trinian’s, the investment is well worth it.

Book Review: London Tales, by Greg Stekelman

London Tales

I’ve been a fan of The Man Who Fell Asleep, aka Greg Stekelman, for some time. Before web 2.0 was a meaningless phrase, he created a surreal corner of the internet that I often felt drawn to. Now that social media is dominent, @themanwhofell is a reassuring, other-worldly presence on Twitter.

In November last year Greg published London Tales, a collection of 100 images and text contained in a beautifully produced, limited edition hardback book. I have copy number 126 of 250.

I read it on the last day of the Christmas holidays, wanting time to absorb it’s themes: of wanting to be someone else, of existential shame, of never letting go of a parallel life, of an obsession with the now, of worrying, of anxiety, of looking for clues, of the eternal tourist, and of killing the days with words and pictures.

In Greg’s own words, “it’s not really about London. Or at least, it’s not about anyone else’s London except my own. It’s mostly my own wanderings around the familiar streets of north London suburbia. [...] I’d like to think it walks the right line between self-analysis and morbid narcissism. Most of my writing walks a tightrope between silliness and self-pity. I try not to fall off.”

I found it absorbing and slightly voyeuristic to have a glimpse into another human beings thoughts and fantasies. I guess all works of art have this quality… but have you ever sat opposite someone on the bus or the Tube and wondered what they were thinking? I feel like I’ve been allowed into another person’s stream of consciousness, where some of the thoughts are comforting, some of the thoughts are bleak, but all of them help me to connect in some way with the author.

The text has a poetry-like feel, accompanied by snapshot-pictures of a London that is both familiar and strange. I hope that Greg does more work of this kind, and takes some comfort in the knowledge that when the 250 copies of his book are sold, he will have shared something of himself with a mixture of friends and strangers.

At £40, think of this book as a gift to yourself, and if they haven’t all sold, you can buy one from here.