Contact Nicolas Granger-Taylor 35 Grafton Way, London W1T 5DB tel: 020 7387 7942 Mobile: 07791 029 770 email

With the possibility of shared passion and enthusiasm, with the opportunity for meeting new people and old friends, you are warmly invited to embark upon:   The London Adventure     thelondonadventure.co.uk

What is the London Adventure? The name for this informal literary club has been taken from Machen's third volume of autobiography, The London Adventure or The Art Of Wandering. The intention for the club is for members to participate in regular meetings at London locations connected with obscure or neglected authors. Other literary personages, such as illustrators and publishers, could also be subjects of meetings. Special attention could be given to anniversaries - births, deaths, publications, and other significant occasions. Members are requested to take on the leadership of future meetings, guiding the club around places related to their chosen subject. Other participants are encouraged to contribute by sharing their thoughts and questions, and with readings from works by or about the subject. These shall not be guided tours so much as inquiries, explorations and celebrations. All walks are free. For further information, comments, suggestions and contributions, please contact: Nicolas Granger-Taylor, 35 Grafton Way, London W1T 5DB, England. Home: 020 7387 7942. Mobile: 07791029770. To email please click here

EXPLORATIONS INTO HIDDEN LITERARY LONDON   CALENDAR OF WALKS 2007   May 12th ………….. DION FORTUNE   June 9th …………… NORTH SOHO 999   June 23rd …………. ARTHUR RIMBAUD   July 14th …………… JAMES McNEILL WHISTLER   September 16th ……. PATRICK HAMILTON – A BRIGHTON ADVENTURE   October 21st.……… JOHN MINTON     All walks are free After each walk there will be a collection for voluntary donations to The London Adventure Children’s Fund       Also on this page:   FORTHCOMING WALKS   PREVIOUS WALKS   THE LONDON ADVENTURE CHILDREN'S FUND   Alexia Lazou leading the Beardsley walk.   DION FORTUNE Priestess of the Mysteries Presented by Christina Oakley Harrington Saturday 12th May 2007, 3pm Your rendezvous with Dion Fortune commences at the entrance to Bayswater Underground Station. Look for a blonde lady of a certain age, holding a long black umbrella that signals Edwardian London, and join her on a tour of the London haunts of Dion Fortune (1890-1946), one of the most influential occultists and probably the most preeminent esoteric novelist of the 20th century. Trained in Western kabbalistic occultism in a lodge of the Golden Dawn, Dion Fortune went on to found her own order, Servants of the Inner Light. She wrote novels which included Egyptian reincarna­tion, erotic rituals, Celtic mysticism, derring-do, psychic attacks, and instruction in the philosophy of Western occultism. The walk will last 2-3 hours, concluding at a local public house.   Recommended reading: Dion Fortune, The Goat-Foot God (1936); The Sea Priestess (1938); Moon Magic (1956) Alan Richardson, The Magical Life of Dion Fortune: Priestess of the 20th Century (1991) Gareth Knight, Dion Fortune and The Inner Light (2000)   Christina Oakley Harrington is a historian of religion and magical movements, and is published with Oxford University Press. She runs Treadwell’s Bookshop in Covent Garden (website: www.treadwells-london.com).   back to top of page   IN ASSOCIATION WITH THE SOHEMIAN SOCIETY NORTH SOHO 999 A True Story of Gangs and Gun-crime in 1940s London Presented by Paul Willetts Saturday 9th June 2007, 3pm On the corner of Tottenham Street and Tottenham Court Road, a few yards north of Goodge Street Underground Station, you’ll find a man clutching a copy of Fabian of the Yard. Join him for a walk through the blitzed, smog-shrouded streets of 1940s Fitzrovia. The tour focuses on the epidemic of gun-crime and teenage gangsterism that took place during the aftermath of World War Two. What became known as the post-war crime wave reached its bloody climax on 29 April 1947 when a 17-year old armed robber and his two accomplices executed a passer-by on Charlotte Street. Minutes later, the gunmen found themselves at the centre of one of the biggest and most brilliant police investigations of the twentieth-century. This extraordinary story was populated by an incongruous cast, encompassing the forensic pioneer Sir Bernard Spilsbury, the photographer Bert Hardy, the hangman Albert Pierrepoint, the film star Ingrid Bergman and the flamboyant detective Robert Fabian. It subsequently spawned a film, The Blue Lamp, starring Dirk Bogarde, and Britain’s first hit TV cop show, Fabian of Scotland Yard. The walk will last approximately 1½ hours, concluding in the upstairs room of the Wheatsheaf public house at 25 Rathbone Place. Signed copies of North Soho 999 will be on sale there.   Recommended reading: Paul Willetts, North Soho 999 (2007) Robert Fabian, Fabian of the Yard (1950) Sally Fiber, The Fitzroy Tavern (1995)   Paul Willetts is the author of North Soho 999 and Fear and Loathing in Fitzrovia, a biography of the Soho dandy Julian Maclaren-Ross. His writing has also appeared in The Independent on Sunday, The Times and other publications.   back to top of page   ARTHUR RIMBAUD IN LONDON Presented by Robert Yates Saturday 23rd June 2007, 3pm I am an ephemeral and not too discontented citizen of a metropolis thought to be modern because every known taste has been avoided in the furnishings and exteriors of the houses as well as in the layout of the city. Here you will not be able to make out the remains of any monument to superstition. Morality and language have been reduced to their simplest expression, at last! [from Rimbaud’s prose poem “City”, probably written in London 1872/3]       Under the statue of Richard Cobden, opposite Mornington Crescent Underground Station, look for the man in black holding a biography of Arthur Rimbaud, and join him on a tour of places associated with the French poet, accompanied by readings from translations of his work. Arthur Rimbaud (1854-1891) was a precocious genius who revolutionised French poetry in his verse and prose poems, which were all probably written before he reached the age of 20. Rimbaud lived in London in 1872-3 at the height of his tempestuous and often violent relationship with fellow poet Paul Verlaine. It was a period of intense poetic creativity for both writers. They rented rooms in several areas of London during their time here, including Royal College Street and Howland Street. The walk will last approximately 2 hours, concluding at a local public house.   Recommended reading: Arthur Rimbaud, Collected Poems (Penguin, 1962) Enid Starkie, Arthur Rimbaud (1961) Graham Robb, Rimbaud (2000) Jean-Luc Steinmetz, Rimbaud: Presence of an Enigma (2001)   Robert Yates works as a translator of French and other languages. He has studied the life and works of Rimbaud on-and-off for the past 20 years. His translations of Rimbaud and Baudelaire have appeared in The Wolf magazine and on the Brindin Press website. He is a mainstay of the London poetry scene and a founder member of the Vintage Poison poetry collective, whose first anthology was published this year.   back to top of page   JAMES McNEILL WHISTLER A Dandy in Chelsea Presented by Antony Clayton Saturday 14th July 2007, 3pm Outside Chelsea Library, in the King’s Road at the junction with Sydney Street (about 15 minutes walk from either Sloane Square or South Kensington Underground stations), join the man bearing a copy of Whistler’s distinctive butterfly signature for a walk around places with Whistlerian associations, such as the site of Cremorne Gardens (inspiration for the notorious “Nocturne in Black and Gold: the Falling Rocket”), Battersea Reach, Battersea Bridge and some of his many residences. Printmaker, designer, teacher, critic, polemicist, flamboyant dandy, acerbic wit, ebullient self-publicist, irascible litigant and a serious artist of considerable refinement, James McNeill Whistler (1834-1903) was one of the most controversial figures in the London art world of the late-Victorian period. Educated in the Parisian studio of Charles Gleyre and influenced by Japanese art and design, Whistler spent many of his most productive years in Chelsea, capturing crepuscular atmospheric effects on the Thames and producing some of his most memorable portraits. His distinctive Nocturnes, Arrangements, Symphonies and Harmonies verged on abstraction and challenged the orthodox Victorian belief in the primacy of subject matter, so much so, that John Ruskin famously accused him of, “flinging a pot of paint in the public’s face”. Many writers of the time, such as Baudelaire, Mallarmé, Verlaine, Swinburne and Oscar Wilde, were fascinated by his work, although he often fell out with friends and admirers. The walk will last approximately 2 hours and will finish at an appropriate alehouse.   Recommended reading: J. M. Whistler, The Gentle Art of Making Enemies (1892) Tom Pocock, Chelsea Reach (1970) Stanley Weintraub, Whistler: a Biography (1974) Robin Spencer, Whistler: a Retrospective (1989)   Antony Clayton is the author of the following books, published by Historical Publications: Subterranean City: Beneath the Streets of London (2000), London’s Coffee Houses: A Stimulating Story (2003), Decadent London (2005), The Folklore of London (forthcoming, 2008), and Blandland: The Banalisation of Britain (forthcoming, 2008). He is contributing editor of The London Adventure, the forthcoming collection of essays based on past London Adventure walks.     back to top of page   PATRICK HAMILTON’S SINISTER BRIGHTON Presented by Marc Glendening Sunday 16th September 2007, 3pm Please note that this walk is on a Sunday (not the usual Saturday) Meet in front of the old West Pier in Brighton, where a representative of Mr Hamilton will await you: look out for a tall gentleman wearing a tweed jacket, hat, old school tie, sharply pressed trousers and Oxford brogues, and carrying a copy of Picture Post. Follow him to enter the menacing world of Patrick Hamilton (1904-1962) and that of the seductive but psychopathic Ralph Ernest Gorse. Thought to have been based on real-life murderer and fraudster Neville Heath, the character of Gorse was to feature in three of Hamilton’s novels, including the Brighton-based The West Pier, in which we are introduced to him as a young man seeking to master the dark arts of personal deception. Like all Hamilton’s books, the Gorse trilogy offers an incisive and perversely humorous insight into the British class structure and culture of the period between the First and Second World Wars. You will visit venues associated with The West Pier and Hamilton’s own early life. The walk will last approximately two hours, concluding at a local public house. Copies of the recently-published Black Spring Press edition of The Gorse Trilogy will be available for sale on the day.   Recommended reading: Patrick Hamilton, The Gorse Trilogy: The West Pier, Mr Stimpson and Mr Gorse, Unknown Assailant (Black Spring Press, 2007); Hangover Square (1941) Nigel Jones, Through a Glass Darkly (1992) Sean French, Patrick Hamilton (1993)   [See following walk for biographical note on Marc Glendening]   back to top of page   THE JOHN MINTON EXPERIENCE Presented by Marc Glendening Sunday 21st October 2007, 3pm Please note that this walk is on a Sunday (not the usual Saturday) Rendezvous outside the Windsor Castle, 114-116 Campden Hill Road (five minutes walk from Notting Hill Gate Underground Station: take the left-hand stairs marked “Notting Hill Gate South Side and Ken­sington Church Street”). There you will be greeted by a tall man wearing a flamboyantly coloured scarf. Travel with him back in time to the louche, alcohol-fuelled and sex-charged ambience of post-war bohemia. You will visit artists’ studios and drinking dens asso­ciated with the extrovert but deeply troubled painter, John Minton (1917-1957). In addition to his prolific and highly acclaimed body of work, Minton was at the epicentre of a 1940s and ’50s cultural vortex featuring artists such as the hell-raising Scotsmen Colquhoun and MacBryde, Keith Vaughan, Rodrigo and Elinor Moynihan, Michael Ayrton and Francis Bacon, as well as Dylan Thomas and the ultimate Sohemian, Henrietta Moreas. The second half of this walk will involve taking a tube from Kensington High Street to South Kensington, and then a hearty half-hour walk to Chelsea Embankment. The walk will conclude at Apollo Place, Chelsea Embankment, where Minton took his own life in 1957. The John Minton Experience will last approximately 2½ hours. As a prelude, if you wish to join Marc Glendening for a drink and a chat before the walk, he will be at the Windsor Castle from 2pm.   Recommended reading: Francis Spalding, John Minton: Dance Till the Stars Come Down (2005) Francis Spalding et al, John Minton 1917-1957: A Selective Retrospective (Royal College of Art catalogue, 1994) Daniel Farson, Soho in the Fifties (1987) Virginia Ironside, Janey and Me: Growing up with My Mother (2000) John Moynihan, Restless Lives: The Bohemian World of Rodrigo and Elinor Moynihan (2003)   Marc Glendening is co-founder and secretary of the Sohemian Society, which celebrates the cultural heritage of Soho (www.sohemians.com). He is the campaign director of the all-party Democracy Movement and is an active member of the Libertarian Alliance.   back to top of page   Forthcoming   THE LONDON ADVENTURE A volume of essays on London literary figures by London Adventure walk leaders   AUBREY BEARDSLEY by Alexia Lazou ALEISTER CROWLEY by Mark Pilkington CHARLES FORT by John Rimmer ARTHUR MACHEN by Nicolas Granger-Taylor EDWARD HERON-ALLEN by Joan Navarre BARON CORVO by Bryan Welch ARTHUR SYMONS by Antony Clayton MICHAEL ARLEN by Mark Valentine SAX ROHMER by Antony Clayton PATRICK HAMILTON by Marc Glendening WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS by Bill Redwood   back to top of page   Previous London Adventure walks:   DAVID JONES October 14, 2006   PATRICK HAMILTON September 24, 2006   BARON CORVO September 2, 2006   CHARLES FORT July 8, 2006   WALTER SICKERT May 27, 2006   FLORENCE FARR April 29, 2006   ARTHUR SYMONS April 8, 2006   PATRICK HAMILTON'S DANGEROUS LONDON Sunday 23 October 2005, 3pm Please use this link to read a review of the Patrick Hamilton Walk   WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS Saturday 10 September 2005, 3pm Please use this link to read a review of the William Burroughs Walk   BRAM STOKER Saturday 13 August 2005, 6pm   THE LEGEND AND LITERATURE OF BLEEDING HEART YARD Wednesday 13 July 2005, 7.30pm   THE REVD MONTAGUE SUMMERS: Demonologist Saturday 25 June 2005, 3pm   JULIAN MACLAREN-ROSS Saturday 21 May 2005, 3pm   ARTHUR MACHEN: The Sage of St John's Wood Saturday 23 April 2005, 3pm   MICHAEL ARLEN CAVALIER OF THE STREETS Saturday 23rd October 2004  Please use this link to read a review of the Michael Arlen Walk   SAX ROHMER'S WEST END Saturday 2nd October 2004  Please use this link to read a review of the Sax Rohmer Walk   THE MYSTERIES OF THE HILL: ARTHUR MACHEN AND FRIENDS IN WEST LONDON Saturday 3 July 2004    EDWARD HERON-ALLEN, F.R.S. Saturday 12 June 2004   NATSUME SOSEKI: THE TWO MOST MISERABLE YEARS OF HIS LIFE Saturday 29 May 2004   WOMEN OF THE GOLDEN DAWN Saturday 24 April 2004   ALEISTER CROWLEY AND THE GOLDEN DAWN Saturday 22nd November 2003  Please use this link to read a review of the Crowley Walk   M.P. SHIEL : LONDON PALACES OF THE KING IN EXILE Saturday 8th November 2003  Please use this link to read a review of the M.P. Shiel Walk   ERNEST DOWSON: A BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION Saturday 2nd August 2003  Please use this link to read a review of the Dowson Walk   AUBREY BEARDSLEY: PIERROT OF PIMLICO AND PICCADILLY Sunday 29th June 2003 Please use this link to read a review of the Beardsley Walk   THE HEART OF DRACULA'S CITY Sunday 18th May 2003 Please use this link to read a review of the Dracula Walk   ARTHUR MACHEN IN THE 1890's Saturday 5th April 2003    Please use this link to read a review of the Machen in the 1890's Walk back to top of page      At the end of each walk there will be a collection of voluntary donations to The London Adventure Children's Fund IMPORTANT FUND NEWS!   THE LONDON ADVENTURE RUSSIAN ORPHANS FUND: A REPORT   THE LONDON ADVENTURE CHILDREN’S FUND: AN INTRODUCTION   Dear London Adventurer I would like to draw your attention to the change of name of the Fund; formerly The London Adventure Russian Orphans Fund, it is now The London Adventure Children’s Fund. For more on this, please see below for Drika Makariev’s Fund Report and my introduction to the Children’s Fund; below that you will find information on Kids Company, the charity organisation we will be donating to this year. With all best wishes, Nicolas Granger-Taylor     The London Adventure Russian Orphans Fund Report by Drika Makariev April 2007 Thank you to everyone who has contributed to The London Adventure Russian Orphans Fund. In the past year your donations have raised $1,449! Last month my husband went to Moscow and has identified an orphanage in Serpuhov, a small city three hours outside of Moscow that would greatly benefit from the donation. Friends of ours will visit the orphanage and decide what to purchase based on its specific needs. When this process is complete I will provide an itemization to the Fund detailing the expenditures of the donation. Last year’s donation of $1,200 was given to an orphanage in Reutov, a town on the outskirts of Moscow,* and was contributed toward the restoration of the orphanage. Our original agreement with the orphanage was that the donation was to be spent on books, toys, and games for the children. This past year the orphanage was undergoing renovations, and when renovation costs exceeded the expected projections, the orphanage director had to weigh the benefits of spending the donation on toys and books against eliminating many of the reconstruction plans. While not conforming to our expectations, I think her decision put the donation money to good use. The children have directly benefited from your contributions and are immensely pleased with their new arrangements. Before the renovation the orphanage was rather gloomy with evident spots and cracks in the ceilings and walls; there was one sleeping room each for boys and for girls. Now the orphanage is much brighter and the children sleep in suites consisting of several bedrooms each. The suites create more intimate, “family” environments and privacy for the children. Research shows that children do much better with this arrangement and institutions are encouraged to make this change if possible. I’m very glad that this orphanage was able to update their dilapidated building. As trips to Russia for my husband and I are becoming less frequent and predictable, I find that I am not able to be as active in the distribution of the funds as I would like and feel that it is best to step down as overseas representative. In addition, the Russian government is now requiring that donations from foreign individuals or organizations be reported to and monitored by the State. This makes it much more difficult to give money to Russian orphanages and less likely that orphanage directors will want to accept donations from foreigners because of the extensive paperwork and hassle that it involves. I have truly treasured the opportunity to distribute the funds to the orphanages and be part of the children’s lives. This experience has impressed upon me that little acts can make a great difference in instilling in children the feeling that they are cared for and valued. With best wishes, Drika Makariev Ph.D. student, University of California, Davis   * Social Rehabilitation Center "Children's Home", 8 Gagarin St., Reutov, Moscow Region back to top of page back to Fund news   THE LONDON ADVENTURE CHILDREN’S FUND Secretary: Nicolas Granger-Taylor Treasurer: Juliet Morel As Drika Makariev has stated in her report, the money raised recently by The London Adventure Russian Orphans Fund will go towards the purchase of books, games, toys and art materials for the children of the Serpuhov orphanage outside Moscow. A further report on the expenditure of this donation will be delivered in due course. For their invaluable work with the Fund these past two years, we would like to take this opportunity to warmly thank Drika and her husband, Oleg Makariev, and their friends and family. In light of the restrictive and uncertain factor of the increased interference of the Russian authorities with regard to foreign charitable aid as mentioned in Drika’s report, and after much consideration, we have chosen to discontinue our donations to Russia for the time being. The Fund has been renamed “The London Adventure Children’s Fund”, and we will direct future donations to organisa­tions which benefit children primarily, but not necessarily exclusively, in the London area. This year the organisation we have chosen to support is Kids Company, based in Borough, South London. Below you will find some basic information on Kids Company, taken from their publicity handout. Juliet & I recently visited the Kids Company Urban Academy and were deeply inspired and moved, not least by the energy and dedication of the staff and the enthusi­astic involvement of the children themselves. We will be giving one large donation after the walks season ends in October (Kids Company have asked for a single donation for the year, which will be easier to manage & to allocate). The money will be given as a “restricted” donation: this means it will only be spent on those areas we specify – the supply of books, games, toys and art materials. We feel privileged for the opportunity to make a difference in the lives of these children, and hope that London Adventure members will support the Children’s Fund with as much generosity as they did the Russian Orphan’s Fund. With all best wishes, Nicolas Granger-Taylor   KIDS COMPANY Kids Company supports children with severe behavioural, emotional and social difficulties resulting from significant childhood trauma and/or neglect. Many of them are living in chronic deprivation due to extreme poverty and little or no support from the adults in their family. They often suffer from abuse, mental health problems, substance misuse and homelessness. Risk factors identified by Government for vulnerable children and young people include poverty, involvement or potential involvement in crime, low educational attainment and threats to mental health. On average, Kids Company children presented with an astounding fourteen risk factors per child. These children’s typical experience of adults, whether they are parents, carers or professionals, is of being failed, rejected or harmed by them. Kids Company reaches these children through word-of-mouth on the streets. We aim to restore their trust and give them an environment where they begin the healing process through an informal but carefully designed support system that includes psychotherapy, education, art and sports, and hot meals. We also provide practical support such as accompanying them to youth courts, finding accommodation, advocacy with mental health teams or even in some instances supporting a lone teenage girl during the birth of her child. We are currently supporting around 661 children at the Arches II, our drop-in and education centre in South London, 100 children in our post-sixteen educational institute, the Urban Academy, and a further 10,000 children in 30 schools across London. In April 2005, the Treasury gave us a grant of approximately £3.4million over three years from “The Invest To Save Budget”. This provides us with half our running costs for three years and we will receive it if we can match it with our own fundraising from the private sector. Further information can be found on our website: www.kidsco.org.uk, by e-mailing us at info@kidsco.org.uk or by calling us on 0845 644 6838.   Kids Company is a registered charity no. 1068298 and company no. 3442083. Registered office: Sherborne House, 34 Decima Street, London SE1 4QQ. Contact: Nicolas Granger-Taylor, 35 Grafton Way, London W1T 5DB Tel: 020 7387 7942 Mobile: 07791 029 770 Email: ngrangertaylor@aol.com   back to top of page back to Fund news   ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS For their assistance and encouragement in the creation of The London Adventure and the inaugural walk, Nicolas Granger-Taylor would like to express his gratitude to Mark Samuels, Roger Dobson, Ray Russell, Mark Valentine, Jeremy Cantwell, John Ricketts, Jon Preece, Adrian Eckersley, Sue Phillips, Steven Halliwell, Peter Granger-Taylor, Hero Granger-Taylor, Jacqueline Granger-Taylor, the British Museum, the Honourable Society of Gray's Inn, and Janet Pollock. To email please click here    back to top of page   page updated 6th May 2007