Slightly Foxed

Latest Episodes:

9: Well-Cultivated Words Jul 15, 2019

Show notes

Gail, Hazel and host Philippa dig into the subject of garden writing with the journalist and social historian Ursula Buchan and Matt Collins, nature writer and Head Gardener at London’s Garden Museum. The conversation meanders convivially in the usual Slightly Foxed manner, via daredevil plant-hunters, early wild gardening advocates such as Gertrude Jekyll, William Robinson and Vita Sackville-West, and the passing passions and fashions of garden design, with a peek over the hedge at Christopher Lloyd’s Great Dixter along the way. And there’s the usual round-up of the latest bookish harvest from the Slightly Foxed office and plenty of recommendations for reading off the beaten track too.
The digits in brackets following each listing refer to the minute and second they are mentioned. (Episode duration: 35 minutes; 50 seconds)
Books Mentioned
We may be able to get hold of second-hand copies of the out-of-print titles listed below. Please get in touch with Anna in the Slightly Foxed office for more information.

84, Charing Cross Road, Helene Hanff. Plain Foxed Edition published 1 September 2019, available to order now (2:24)
Corduroy, Adrian Bell. Plain Foxed Edition published 1 August 2019, available to order now (2:30)
Wood and Garden, Gertrude Jekyll is out of print (11:33)
The Wild Garden, William Robinson (11:34)
The English Flower Garden, William Robinson is out of print (11:38)
We Made a Garden, Margery Fish (13:27)
A Green and Pleasant Land, Ursula Buchan (15:23)
Graham Stuart Thomas titles are out of print (17:04)
Dear Friend and Gardener: Letters on Life and Gardening, Beth Chatto & Christopher Lloyd is out of print (18:46)
Forest: Walking among Trees, Matt Collins. With photographs by Roo Lewis (19:20)
Meetings with Remarkable Trees, Thomas Packenham (19:48)
Trees, Hugh Johnson (19:52)
The Hidden Life of Trees, Peter Wohlleben
Oriental Vegetables, Joy Larkcom is out of print but both The Salad Garden and Grow Your Own Vegetables are available (21:37)
The English Gardener, William Cobbett is out of print (22:06)
The Well-Tempered Garden and In My Garden, Christopher Lloyd (22:49)
The Diary of a Bookseller, Shaun Bythell (31:25)
Where the Hornbeam Grows, Beth Lynch (32:05)
Old Glory, Jonathan Raban (32:33)
So I Have Thought of You: The Letters of Penelope Fitzgerald, Ed. Terence Dooley is out of print (32:54)
Wilding, Isabella Tree (33:44)

Related Slightly Foxed Articles & Illustrations

An article on Beth Chatto, The Dry Garden will be published in a forthcoming issue of Slightly Foxed (18:11)
A Well-tempered Gardener, Michael Leapman on the garden writings of Christopher Lloyd, Issue 59 (22:49)

Other Links

Ursula Buchan is an award-winning journalist, social historian and garden writer (3:50)
Matt Collins is a nature writer, and Head Gardener at the Garden Museum in Lambeth, London (6:02)
David Douglas (25 June 1799–12 July 1834) was a Scottish botanist, best known as the namesake of the Douglas-fir (10:08)
Hortus, a gardening journal (20:08)
All back issues of Slightly Foxed are available to browse and buy here (30:20)

Opening music: Preludio from Violin Partita No.3 in E Major by Bach
Sound effects:
An English Country Garden in July by Keith Selmes
Bees and bumblebees foraging by odilonmarcenaro
Thanks to www.freesound.org CC licence, attribution
The Slightly Foxed Podcast is hosted by Philippa Lamb and produced by Podcastable

8: Leaving that Place called Home Jun 15, 2019

Show notes

Hazel, Jennie and host Philippa explore the art of travel writing with the acclaimed author and biographer Sara Wheeler, and Barnaby Rogerson of the well-loved independent publisher Eland Books. Buckle-up and join us on an audio adventure that takes in a coach trip around England, an Antarctic sojourn, a hairy incident involving a Victorian lady and her trusty tweed skirt and a journey across Russia in the footprints of its literary greats, with nods to Bruce Chatwin, Isabella Bird, Norman Lewis, Martha Gellhorn and Patrick Leigh Fermor along the way. And to bring us back down to earth, there’s the usual round-up of news from back home in Hoxton Square and plenty of recommendations for reading off the beaten track.
The digits in brackets following each listing refer to the minute and second they are mentioned. (Episode duration: 39 minutes; 01 seconds)
Books Mentioned

Slightly Foxed Issue 62 (2:05)
The Fountain Overflows, Volume I of Rebecca West’s ‘Saga of the Century’ (2:36)
Something Wholesale, Eric Newby (4:20)
Love and War in the Apennines, Eric Newby (4:24)
Terra Incognita: Travels in Antarctica, Sara Wheeler (8:00)
A Dragon Apparent, Norman Lewis (11:49)
In Patagonia, Bruce Chatwin. Sara Wheeler abbreviates the opening line, which reads in full: ‘In my grandmother’s dining-room there was a glass-fronted cabinet and in the cabinet was a piece of skin.’ (18:39)
Growing: Seven Years in Ceylon and The Village in the Jungle, Leonard Woolf (19:50)
Travels with Charley, John Steinbeck (20:35)
Semi Invisible Man: The Life of Norman Lewis, Julian Evans (21:09)
Naples ‘44, Norman Lewis (21:31)
Passage to Juneau, Jonathan Raban (22:24)
Mud and Stars, Sara Wheeler, published 4 July 2019 (23:27)
The Saddest Pleasure, Moritz Thomsen (24:29)
A Time of Gifts and Between the Woods and the Water, Patrick Leigh Fermor (25:16)
Arabs, Tim Mackintosh-Smith (33:32)
Lost in Translation, Eva Hoffman (34:31)
A Woman in the Polar Night, Christiane Ritter is currently out of print. The edition with an introduction by Sara Wheeler will be published by Pushkin Press in November 2019 (35:52)

Related Slightly Foxed Articles & Illustrations

Mood Music, Rebecca Willis on Rebecca West’s ‘Saga of the Century’, Issue 62 (2:22)
Ire and Irritability, Pauline Melville on Sense and Sensibility, Issue 62 (2:56)
Travelling Fearlessly, Maggie Fergusson interviews Colin Thubron in Issue 58 (20:26)
A Great Adventure, Andy Merrills on Patrick Leigh Fermor, A Time of Gifts and Between the Woods and the Water, Issue 38 (25:24)
In Search of Home, Sue Gee on Lost in Translation in Issue 55 (34:31)

Other Links

The Slightly Foxed Podcast website page of episodes and reviews (1:00)
Independent Bookshop Week 2019, 15-22 June. Follow #IndieBookshopWeek and @booksaremybag online (3:38)
Eland Books (11:39)
Katy MacMillan-Scott, Adventures for Harriet: Travelling from the Hook of Holland to Istanbul (31:45)
Lodestars Anthology, selected issues available to buy from Slightly Foxed here (37:41)
Rucksack Magazine (37:58)

Music and sound effects
Opening music: Preludio from Violin Partita No.3 in E Major by Bach
Reading music: Lost Memories courtesy of FreeSfx.co.uk

The Slightly Foxed Podcast is hosted by Philippa Lamb and produced by Podcastable

7: A Window on the World May 15, 2019

Show notes

Gail, Steph and Anna go behind the scenes with booksellers Brett Wolstencroft of Daunt Books and Kathleen Smith of Topping & Co. Bath to talk about the reality and romance of life running two of the country’s finest bookshops. Andrew Hawkins recounts the tale of a London publisher who tried his hand at repping and ended up in a spot of bother with a drunken poet in Fife, and there’s the usual round-up of recommended reading and news from Hoxton Square.

The digits in brackets following each listing refer to the minute and second they are mentioned. (Episode duration: 38 minutes; 30 seconds)

Books Mentioned

Slightly Foxed Issue 62, will be published on 1 June. Available to order now (5:34)
Shaun Bythell, The Diary of a Bookseller (30:12)
Jen Campbell, Weird Things Customers Say in Bookshops (30:16)
A Plain Foxed Edition of 84, Charing Cross Road will be published in September 2019. Available to order now (30:22)
Miriam Toews, All My Puny Sorrows (30:40)
Patrick O’Brian, Master & Commander and The Far Side of the World (31:46)
Andrew Miller, Now We Shall Be Entirely Free (32:36)
Angela Carter, The Magic Toyshop and The Bloody Chamber (33.02)

Related Slightly Foxed Articles & Illustrations

Mike Petty’s article entitled ‘Up There on a Visit’ was published in Slightly Foxed Issue 8 (23:14)
Maggie Fergusson’s article on Helene Hanff, 84, Charing Cross Road was originally published in Slightly Foxed Issue 24, then republished in Issue 48. It appears as the preface to the Plain Foxed Edition of 84, Charing Cross Road (30:22)
Grant McIntyre’s three articles on Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey/Maturin novels – ‘Friendship of Opposites’, ‘The House that Jack Built’ and ‘O’Brian’s World’ – were published sequentially in Slightly Foxed Issues 40, 42 and 44 (30:46)

Other Links

A full list of Slightly Foxed stockists can be found on our website: Stockists (1:09)
The Idler Festival, Hampstead, London, 12-14 July 2019 (3:28)
The Llangwm Literary Fesitval, Pembrokeshire, Wales, 9-11 August 2019 (3:34)
Ways with Words Festival, Dartington, Devon, 5-15 July 2019 (3:52)
The Slightly Foxed 2019 Readers’ Day will be held on Saturday 2 November at The Art Workers’ Guild in Bloomsbury, London. Tickets now available to Slightly Foxed magazine subscribers only. From £60 for a day ticket (4:10)
Daunt Books, Marylebone (6:34)
Topping & Company Booksellers of Bath (6:38)
Topping & Company Booksellers are opening a bookshop in Blenheim Place, Edinburgh in the summer of 2019 (16:55)
The image for Episode 7: A Window on the World features a photograph of Topping & Co. Bath courtesy of Miranda’s Notebook

Music & Sound Effects

Opening music: Preludio from Violin Partita No.3 in E Major by Bach
Reading music: ‘Roads that burned out boots’ by Jahzzar shared under a Creative Commons licence 3.0, via Free Music Archive. No changes were made.
Sound effects: auto engine and crowded bar thanks to FreeSfx.co.uk

The Slightly Foxed Podcast is hosted by Philippa Lamb and produced by Podcastable

6: Well-Written Lives Apr 15, 2019

Show notes

Gail, Hazel, Jennie and host Philippa are joined at the table by eminent biographer Adam Sisman to discuss the delicate business of delving into the lives of others – warts and all or, sometimes, all warts no all. The actor Nigel Anthony lends his voice to Edward Lear’s surreal verbal contortions, unearthing the deep sorrow that hid beneath the nonsense.

The digits in brackets following each listing refer to the minute and second they are mentioned. (Episode duration: 38 minutes; 6 seconds)

Books Mentioned

Eric Newby, Love and War in the Apennines will be published as a Slightly Foxed Edition in clothbound hardback on 1 June. Now available to pre-order (1:50)
Adam Sisman, Hugh Trevor-Roper: The Biography, is out of print, but we may be able to get hold of second-hand copies. Please get in touch for details (8:30)
Hugh Trevor-Roper, The Last Days of Hitler (8:42)
Adam Sisman, John le Carré: The Biography is available from Bloomsbury (9:32)
Adam Sisman, The Professor and the Parson is published on 9 May, and will be available to order in the Summer 2019 Readers’ Catalogue and on the Slightly Foxed website (12:32)
Adam Sisman, Boswell’s Presumptuous Task, is out of print, but we may be able to get hold of second-hand copies. Please get in touch for details (14:16)
Richard Hillary, The Last Enemy. This Slightly Foxed Edition is also available in a bundle with Sebastian Faulks, The Fatal Englishman (17:11)
Vivien Noakes, Edward Lear: The Life of a Wanderer, is out of print, but we may be able to get hold of second-hand copies. Please get in touch for details (19:24)
Kingsley Amis, The Green Man, on which an article by William Palmer appears in Slightly Foxed Issue 20 (27:58)
My Grandfather & Father, Dear Father, by Denis Constanduros are available in a single edition or in a special Last Call Bundle together with the last copies of our earliest available limited-edition, The Flame Trees of Thika by Elspeth Huxley (28.25)
Bart van Es, The Cut Out Girl (29:30)
Tim Pears, The West Country Trilogy: The Horseman, The Wanderers and The Redeemed (31:00)

Related Slightly Foxed Articles & Illustrations

Adam Sisman’s article on Hugh Trevor-Roper’s The Last Days of Hitler is published in Slightly Foxed Issue 61 (8:44)
William Palmer’s article on Vivien Noakes, Edward Lear: The Life of a Wanderer was published in Slightly Foxed Issue 56 (19:24)
Read an extract from Chapter VIII of My Grandfather & Father, Dear Father by Denis Constanduros (28:41)

Other Links

Bart van Es won the 2018 Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize for The Cut Out Girl. The award party was held at Maggs Bros. Ltd (2:31)
The Slightly Foxed 2019 Readers’ Day will be held on Saturday 2 November at The Art Workers Guild in Bloomsbury, London. Tickets will go on sale late May/early June, to Slightly Foxed magazine subscribers only. From £60 for a day ticket (3:44)
The Slightly Foxed Spring 2019 Readers’ Catalogue is available to view and download. The Summer Catalogue will be available on 1 June (18:16)
Nigel Anthony stars in a Jarvis & Ayres Production of Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s The School for Scandal for BBC Radio 3, released soon (25:55)

Music & Sound Effects

Opening music: Preludio from Violin Partita No.3 in E Major by Bach Archive reading music: Erik Satie, Gymnopedie No 3 played by Kevin MacLeod, thanks to www.freemusicarchive.org

The Slightly Foxed Podcast is hosted by Philippa Lamb and produced by Podcastable

5: Revival Mar 15, 2019

Show notes

Gail, Hazel, Anna and Donna Coonan of Virago Modern Classics gather round the table to talk about giving new life to forgotten voices, and Helen Bourne heads for the Pyramids with a young Priscilla Napier.

The digits in brackets following each listing refer to the minute and second they are mentioned. (Episode duration: 33 minutes; 31 seconds)

Books Mentioned

• Slightly Foxed Issue 61 (2:02)

• Priscilla Napier, A Late Beginner (4:41)

• L. M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables (12:00)

• Noel Streatfeild’s Christmas Stories (12:47)

• The Slightly Foxed Edition Gail refers to is Sword of Bone, Anthony Rhodes’s memoir of his experiences of WWII and being evacuated from Dunkirk (15:28)

• Marjorie Hillis, Live Alone and Like It, is available through Little, Brown Book Group (16:00)(16:00)

• Winifred Watson, Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day, is available from Persephone Books (18:40)

• Eric Newby, Love and War in the Apennines (23:26)

• Mary Hocking’s trilogy of titles, Good Daughters, Indifferent Heroes and Welcome Strangers, are out of print, but we may be able to get hold of second-hand copies. Please get in touch for details (29:03)

• Graham Swift, Mothering Sunday (29:37)

• Sigrid Nunez, The Friend (30:06)

• Amor Towles, A Gentleman in Moscow (30:48)

Related Slightly Foxed Articles & Illustrations

• Rowena Macdonald’s article on Philip Hensher’s Kitchen Venom was published in Slightly Foxed Issue 61 (2:18)

• Extract from Priscilla Napier’s memoir, A Late Beginner, read by Helen Bourne (23:54)

• Penelope Lively’s preface to A Late Beginner was also published as an article in Slightly Foxed Issue 21

Other Links

• The second-hand bookshop in Canada is called Reasons to Live Books & Records. A full list of Slightly Foxed stockists can be found on our website: Stockists (0:40)

• The Slightly Foxed Subscribers’ Competition 2019 (3:20)

• The Slightly Foxed Spring 2019 Readers’ Catalogue is available to view and download (3:46)

• The Faber Stories series was launched as part of Faber’s 90th anniversary publishing programme (3:52)

• Virago Modern Classics (6:31)

• Virago Children’s Classics (11:35)

• Persephone Books (18:27)

• For subscriptions to Slightly Foxed magazine, and all our available publications, visit www.foxedquarterly.com (33:05)

Music & Sound Effects

Reading: introductory music Elgar’s Salut D’Amour by James Langevin. Incidental music and sound effects courtesy of www.freesound.org. Thanks to Diegolar for footsteps in the desert, to kyles for desert sounds with crickets and grb1029e for Egyptian Discovery.

The Slightly Foxed Podcast is hosted by Philippa Lamb and produced by Podcastable.

4: Viewing Is Essential Feb 15, 2019

Show notes

Gail, Hazel and Jennie talk to the artist and illustrator (and master of pastiche) David Eccles about the craft of marrying image and text. The actress Petra Markham takes to the airwaves with Posy Simmonds, and the printmaker Angie Lewin recalls her experience of being commissioned for a Slightly Foxed cover.

Books Mentioned

Hugh Trevor-Roper, The Last Days of Hitler
Richard Kennedy, A Boy at the Hogarth Press & A Parcel of Time
Gwen Raverat, Period Piece
E. H. Shepard, Drawn from Memory and Drawn from Life
A. A. Milne, Winnie-the-Pooh
Christopher Matthew, Now We are Sixty, with decorations by David Eccles
The Slightly Foxed Cubs edition of The Eagle of the Ninth by Rosemary Sutcliff will be published in September 2019
Posy Simmond’s latest book, Cassandra Darke
Flowers for Mrs Harris by Paul Gallico is also known as Mrs Harris Goes to Paris, and is available in a single volume together with Mrs Harris Goes to New York.
Elizabeth Jenkins, The Tortoise and the Hare
Mathias Enard, Compass
Kathleen Hale’s autobiography, A Slender Reputation, is out of print, but we may be able to get hold of second-hand copies. Please get in touch for details

Related Slightly Foxed Articles & Illustrations

A wood engraving by Hilary Paynter illustrates Adam Sisman’s article on The Last Days of Hitler in Slightly Foxed Issue 61
Slightly Foxed Issue 60 features the illustration ‘Office Life’ by Posy Simmonds
Christopher Robbins’s article on Finnegans Wake was published in Slightly Foxed Issue 22
Angie Lewin is a printmaker and was the cover artist for Slightly Foxed Issue 27
James Nunn provided a pastiche of Eric Ravilious for the cover of Slightly Foxed Issue 17
Maggie Fergusson’s article on Flowers for Mrs Harris was published in Slightly Foxed Issue 20
Nigel Andrew’s article on The Tortoise and the Hare was published in Slightly Foxed Issue 60

Other Links

The shortlist for the 2018 Slightly Foxed Best First Biography Prize.The award party will be held at Maggs Bros
A full list of Slightly Foxed stockists can be found on our website: Stockists
For subscriptions to Slightly Foxed magazine, visit www.foxedquarterly.com

Thanks to
Angie Lewin, speaking at the Slightly Foxed Readers’ Day 2018 at the Art Workers’ Guild in London.

Music & Sound Effects Blue Jeans courtesy of FreeSfx.co.uk

Production Credits The Slightly Foxed Podcast is hosted by Philippa Lamb and produced by Podcastable

3: Stet Jan 15, 2019

Show notes

In Episode 3: Stet, Gail, Hazel and Anna discuss the art of editing with author and creative writing teacher Sue Gee, and Helen Bourne delves into the dark side of Beatrix Potter.

www.foxedquarterly.com/pod

Books Mentioned

Our series of historical novels by Ronald Welch can be found here
Issue 60 of Slightly Foxed
Our series of Rosemary Sutcliff’s books will be published in September, starting with The Eagle of the Ninth
Sue Gee’s novels include Spring Will Be Ours (1988), Reading in Bed (2007) and Trio (2016). The Mysteries of Glass (2004) was longlisted for the Orange prize (now the Women’s Prize for Fiction)
Raymond Carver’s What We Talk About When We Talk About Love was edited by Gordon Lish and is available here
Beatrix Potter’s The Tale of Mr Tod is available here
Beatrix Potter, The Tale of Squirrel Nutkin
Beatrix Potter, The Tale of Jeremy Fisher
Beatrix Potter, The Tale of Pigling Bland
Beatrix Potter, The Tailor of Gloucester
Kate Atkinson’s novels include Transcription, Human Croquet, Behind the Scenes at the Museum, Emotionally Weird
James Hamilton-Paterson, Gerontius
Stet by Diana Athill is out of print, but we may be able to get hold of second hand copies. Please get in touch for details
Jean Rhys, Wide Sargasso Sea
Ronald Blythe’s Word from Wormingford: A Parish Year is out of print, but we may be able to get hold of second hand copies. Please get in touch for details

Related Slightly Foxed Articles & Illustrations

The cover artist for the Summer issue of Slightly Foxed will be Chloe Cheese
Sue Gee’s articles have appeared in Issues 1, 5, 8, 14, 17, 18, 20, 24, 28, 32, 36, 40, 42, 49, 50, 51, 55, 56, 58 and 60 of Slightly Foxed
Sue’s article on The Tale of Mr Tod, Potter’s Dark Materials, was published in Issue 1 of Slightly Foxed

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