More bookshops
London bookshops: to the left
The disappearance of the great left wing bookshops of London is a genuine loss. Two of my favourites were Collets in Charing Cross Road and Central Books in Grays Inn Road. Collets had different bookshops for general publications, international publications and Chinese issues, and also ran a record shop, which was an early repository of world music.
London bookshops RIP: Collets - tatty and esoteric
My memory of Collets is of a labyrinthine set of establishments all on the Charing Cross Road, decorated in sombre colours, selling esoteric Communist publications, Marx's works and Soviet badges and posters. The shops exuded an air of tatty studiousness. Collets bookshops closed down in dribs and drabs, not helped by the demise of the Soviet Union and, if I rememember correctly, a fire, and had gone by the early nineties.
Both Collets and Central Books had explicit links to the Communist Party. Eva Collet was a friend of both the Marx and Engles family and was politically sympathetic.
London bookshops RIP: Central Books
Central Books used to be the Workers' Bookshop and was the official bookshop of the CP. It was an attractive shop with a wide and fascinating selection of books, covering all aspects of left wing thought and literature. Central closed down in 1993.
In both bookshops you could easily discuss both books and ideas with the staff. Neither could withstand the end of the Communist Party, rising property costs and the new global booksellers, and a major London resource was lost.
We want to hear what you've got to say..
Leave a message for us here.Messages
| Message: | 2/2 |
| Date and time: | 23/03/2007 at 12:57:09 |
| Sender: | More Bookshops :: Avi |
| On my rare visits to London from Jerusalem in the '70s, a stop at Collets was a must to find examples of Chinese calligraphy, one of which, a splendid "Dragon," hangs in my study. Was that the shop opposite the Museum, or is my memory playing tricks? Does the shop still exist? | |
| Message: | 1/2 |
| Date and time: | 31/01/2007 at 10:36:13 |
| Sender: | More Bookshops :: Martin |
| I always used to visit Colletts on my trips back to London from university in Wales in the mid-1980s. It was the esential place to stock up on progressive postcards and posters. I've still got some of the postcards on my office wall now - Biff, Leeds Postcrads, and Ray Lowry's 'Has Anybody Seen the Parliamentary Road to Socialism'. Favourite posters included reprints of early Soviet propaganda, and some cracking William Morris designs. | |
