Last night I dreamed that a girl I used to work with had been promoted to the position of area manager. I could see why. She was a fantastic bookseller who had an intuitive understanding of the trade, but I was concerned that she would be undone by certain flaws in her character.
I knew that she would be too proud to take advice, but in spite of this, I laboured over a detailed document that spelled out the need to achieve a balance between the operational demands of the role and the importance of maintaining a good morale. I felt confident that she would listen to me.
Then I woke up and remembered that she'd been sacked for 'financial irregularities' (and some sexual ones too).
Why was I still dreaming about a job I walked out of six years ago? I briefly mentioned it to my wife, but we have an unspoken agreement not to bore each other about our respective dreams, particularly the recurring ones. I keep dreaming about bookselling. My wife dreams that she is back in her grandparents' house, where she lived from the age of nine.
I have to remind myself that I still sell books, even if I now have to work on a farm, watching libidinous bulls sodomising each other - an unedifying spectacle that I wouldn't recommend.
But even worse than the bulls is having to listen to the soft rock radio station, Heart FM, which I can hear through the partition wall of my cowshed. The gaps between the songs have a jingle that boasts "More music variety!", but it's not true. Every morning I hear the same singers: Robin Thicke, Olly Murs, Michael Buble, Adele, Robbie Williams and my least favourite song of all time, the screeching, nasal horror of Cyndi Lauper's "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun".
There are moments, particularly when I can hear Adele being accompanied by the screams of a bull being sexually assaulted, when I wonder what I'm doing with my life. Where did I go wrong?
But there is laughter in the dark, particularly when I find books like "The Bedside Lilliput". Published in 1950, it is a treasure trove of late-1940s culture, featuring Dylan Thomas, V.S.Pritchett, Ronald Searle, Wyndham Lewis, Nancy Mitford, Bill Brandt, Walter de la Mare, Monica Dickens, Arthur C Clarke, Aleister Crowley, Sylvia Townsend Warner, Robert Doisneau and Arthur Marshall.
I will be posting several extracts from The Bedside Lilliput, but I'll begin with a photographic essay from the French photographer, Robert Doisneau (the man who took this famous picture), with the original captions:
I knew that she would be too proud to take advice, but in spite of this, I laboured over a detailed document that spelled out the need to achieve a balance between the operational demands of the role and the importance of maintaining a good morale. I felt confident that she would listen to me.
Then I woke up and remembered that she'd been sacked for 'financial irregularities' (and some sexual ones too).
Why was I still dreaming about a job I walked out of six years ago? I briefly mentioned it to my wife, but we have an unspoken agreement not to bore each other about our respective dreams, particularly the recurring ones. I keep dreaming about bookselling. My wife dreams that she is back in her grandparents' house, where she lived from the age of nine.
I have to remind myself that I still sell books, even if I now have to work on a farm, watching libidinous bulls sodomising each other - an unedifying spectacle that I wouldn't recommend.
But even worse than the bulls is having to listen to the soft rock radio station, Heart FM, which I can hear through the partition wall of my cowshed. The gaps between the songs have a jingle that boasts "More music variety!", but it's not true. Every morning I hear the same singers: Robin Thicke, Olly Murs, Michael Buble, Adele, Robbie Williams and my least favourite song of all time, the screeching, nasal horror of Cyndi Lauper's "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun".
There are moments, particularly when I can hear Adele being accompanied by the screams of a bull being sexually assaulted, when I wonder what I'm doing with my life. Where did I go wrong?
But there is laughter in the dark, particularly when I find books like "The Bedside Lilliput". Published in 1950, it is a treasure trove of late-1940s culture, featuring Dylan Thomas, V.S.Pritchett, Ronald Searle, Wyndham Lewis, Nancy Mitford, Bill Brandt, Walter de la Mare, Monica Dickens, Arthur C Clarke, Aleister Crowley, Sylvia Townsend Warner, Robert Doisneau and Arthur Marshall.
I will be posting several extracts from The Bedside Lilliput, but I'll begin with a photographic essay from the French photographer, Robert Doisneau (the man who took this famous picture), with the original captions:
H'm
Ha!
Oh!
M'm
Sssh
T't
Ah!
Ooh!
The Bedside Lilliput appears to have been a one-off, although there were other literary magazines published in book form during the 1950s.
I wonder what today's equivalents are.
I wonder what today's equivalents are.
