Or Autumn, as we call it in London. We're obviously often busy in the summer, but the Autumn is a great time in London. The leaves start turning colour and falling and there's no better time to retreat to a cosy British Pub... often by a fire.


Richard, our current writer/guide LOVES our literary Pubs. To the point where it's probably best to plan to spend the whole evening with us! Even after the pubs have closed, we are friendly with some of the private members clubs in Soho. So the night can...
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As you know, we're writers and artists ourselves and crazy about our little bit of England and its literature. We've a books list on this website, but we really loved this blog in The Conversation by Heather Green, a PhD Candidate, Literary Heritage at Nottingham Trent University, who works for Wirksworth Heritage Centre.

Some books can really bring to life the place in which they’re set. Their words knit together in such a way that whole landscapes or entire floorplans of buildings you’ve...

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It looks like the UK might be exiting the European Union - So a British Exit - Brexit! I love the wordplay, if not the concept.  I won't get into the politics here (nah, I don't think it's a great idea to leave, and I do remember when I was a kid we were known as the 'poor man of Europe' hence us joining the EEC, but...!) however, we have people from around the world come on our literary pub celebration, and one or two people have mentioned they'd heard stories of rationing and hoarding and w...
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It’s been a busy few weeks in London Literary Pub Crawl land. We’ve had three parties this week, including our first ‘Coffee Shop’ Tour - the non-alcoholic version of the Literary Pub Crawl - for 35 young students from South Africa. If you’ve been to see us you’ll know there are a few ‘adult’ stories. We took those out of course and the whole group were fantastic and really seemed to get what we were offering. 

Later we hosted a private tour with two Americans. Rusty was the Fa...

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We were all a bit surprised when Bob Dylan was awarded his Nobel prize for literature.  Our Charles Dickens Christmas Crawl stops at the very pub where Bob Dylan gave his first ever public performance outside the USA!  This is what Richard Brown, Reader in Modern Literature at the University of Leeds thought about it.

To the surprise of many, Bob Dylan has become the first singer-songwriter to win the Nobel prize in literature.

As the news broke, I was in the middle of teaching James Joyce to s...

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1.  Brexit is a word that has become used as a shorthand way of saying the UK leaving the EU - merging the words Britain and exit to get Brexit, in a same way as a Greek exit from the EU was dubbed Grexit in the past.  A referendum took place in the UK on Thursday 23rd June, 2016.  Everyone in the UK (almost) was eligible to vote, just like in a general election. But on the ballot paper were just two questions.  Should the UK leave the EU or remain in the EU.

2. The E.U. - short for the Euro...

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It's me birthday!  Thanks!  Feel free to send cards. Or cash... :-)

Birthdays are often a time for reflection.  When I first got the idea for the London Literary Pub Crawl, it was because I was taking my M.A. and I was flat broke.  In spite of never having received a grant for education, for reasons known only to the Education Dept I had to fund everything myself.  It was tough - not only the fees, but living in one of the most expensive cities in the world.  But I don't think we'd have done t...
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So the world cup is over.  But here in London, things are still buzzing!  The weather has been fantastic and looks like staying so. And we've been nominated as one of the Top Ten Cultural things to do in London! That's fantastic.  So if you are thinking about visiting London this year, come and see us. We've been somewhat overwhelmed by demand and so we're training up some new actors and we've added extra dates.  We're looking at a new box office system too.  At the moment director Katie and ...
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If you're coming to see us over the summer, the chances are you might meet one of this talented bunch of actors. If you've already been on the London Literary Pub Crawl, you may recognise the alleyway next to the Newman's Arms, George Orwell's local.
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One of the pubs we visit on the tour is The Newman Arms. It's a great pub and unusual in that it's one of very few pubs in the area still owned outright by a family, rather than a brewery. I'll go into more detail about the pub in a later post, but I love the place. And it's appeared in some famous films. But perhaps most famously it's where George Orwell used to drink and is widely believed to be the template for the Proles pub in his novel 1984. You can hear some of his description of the p...
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If you are coming to London for the first time and would like any advice on where to stay or what to do (apart from the Literary Pub Crawl of course) please feel free to contact us. We'll do all we can to help.
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The first of our Christmas tours took place on Saturday 15th, and a great time we had too. This was the scene at the end of the tour in our last pub in Soho. The songs were imminently singable and we're gong to make it a regular Saturday evening thing going forward.

 Happy Christmas and we hope to see you in the New Year. Here's to 2013!



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