Archives: Persephone Post

And now some unforgettable wartime pictures: on Saturday May 10th 1941 ‘bombs came down in dozens’ (wrote Vere Hodgson the next day, p.170 of Few Eggs and No Oranges): ‘Several bombs on Campden Hill but no loss of life. A lot at Knightsbridge. A landline on Harrods. Big fires in [Tottenham Court] Road which is closed…I fear the City got it too – but no details yet.’ This was the southern end of Lamb’s Conduit Street, at the corner with Theobalds Road, on Monday morning 12th May. Number 59, far down on the left out of sight, was undamaged.

In 1840, which is when this map was first published, we were number 52. Unfortunately it’s impossible to see if there was a basement area then or if it has already been filled in (cf. the photograph of our basement window last week). Even though this row of houses has been massively rebuilt (because of both bombing and development) basically it is still the same as it was when first built in the early C18th.

Continuing on the shop theme (readers of the Post will gather that we are very proud of it and its history): this week Lamb’s Conduit Street itself. This is a 1746 map showing that the street was then Red Lyon Street; it led directly to the Foundling Hospital.

This is/was the window on the street side. Presumably there was once a basement area with railings round it and then at some point this was blocked in to create another cellar behind the wall. We don’t use it as it is vast and spooky, extending half under the road, but again one day…

Some of the panelling which would (will) be simply beautiful once restored. To the right is a small bit of the shelving that was built in the nineteenth-century to store lentils, rice, flour – all the ‘dry goods’ that used to be ladled out into a brown paper bag to be weighed and are now almost always pre-packed in unappealing if practical cellophane.

More bannisters, these are in perfect condition having been blocked off and unused for 150 years. One day…

Four of the original bannisters are left – installed in 1702 when Barbon built the street, so technically they are Queen Anne rather than Georgian. Whatever they are, we are extremely proud of them. And hope that one day in the future they will be restored and fully functional again.

Something completely different from eg. the beauty of the Impressionists or flaming June: our basement, which most visitors to the shop do not see although we are always willing to show it. Megan Wilson, art director at Vintage and Anchor Books In New York, who designs our Classic covers, took photographs of the basement when she visited last week. These are the steps down, build in the nineteenth century when the shop became a grocer (before that there was a Georgian, much more delicate staircase which we’ll show tomorrow). Since 2001, when we moved in, the great majority of Persephone books have gone down these steps, after they are delivered from storage in Kings Lynn, and up again, to be sold in the shop or sent out.

The Durand-Ruel exhibition at the National Gallery ends on Sunday but is a must. There are some rather soupy Renoirs, however these are offset by the glorious paintings by Monet, Pissarro and Manet, also some superb blown-up black and white photographs, in particular one at the entrance to the exhibition of the Durand-Ruel gallery in Paris which makes you feel you are standing in the street looking over the road. Meditation: Madame Monet on the Sofa was painted by Monet in 1870 when he was thirty. The painting is normally at the Musée d’Orsay; but in London until Sunday.

A Girl Mending 1910 is by Edmund C Tarbell. What draws the eye immediately is the amazing embroidered coat, which is presumably a kind of dressing-gown/housecoat.