For the love of books

Great bookshops make great cities.   

And, great bookshops with great cafés make fun cities. (We don't have any coffeeshops in bookshops in Islamabad. And, whenever I get the chance, I make a critique of big bad Saeed Book Bank and how they don't have a coffeeshop).   

Remember that insulting moment when the French asked Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie if there were any bookshops in Nigeria? The French - they can't really help being racist can they - were really asking whether people read, are intellectual, like to use their heads and spend money on books.   

I was pleasantly reassured that the English are still reading, buying books, and using their heads.   So, this is about bookshops I've visited or been introduced to during this visit to London. 

My favourite introduction was to Housman, very close to King's Cross. 

Treadwell's Bookshop  in the Bloomsbury area, famous for books on occult and witchcraft
30 April 2022

Housmans , "radical booksellers since 1945", near King's Cross
4 May 2022

South Kensington Books, 5 May 2022

Hurlingham Books, 6 May 2022, Fulham

This is a secondhand bookshop overflowing with books. Reminds me of the "old bookshops" in Islamabad. It took me forever to find this and turns out , it's right behind the Premier Inn on Putney Bridge.  And, here's a piece on Islamabad's old bookshops which hasn't proved to be correct at all - they are still thriving! The piece is Final chapter? The slow death of Islamabad's secondhand bookshops

Goldsboro Books , Brighton, 7 May