the book collector
a building that was world famous and attracting visitors (authors, ex-authors, friends, those who wished to visit the haunts of Byron, Water Scott, Darwin, Livingstone and others) added an interesting perspective to our normal publishing day. Many of our authors drew on original material in our archives for use in their books. In my free time away from publishing I have always found collecting rare books irresistible. Whenever travelling round the country I have invariably dropped into second-hand and antiquar- ian bookshops. Over the years I have built up a collection of early books on canals and railways as well as landscape design and atlases. These I dip into whenever I have moments to spare and they lift me out of the world of editing and the involvement of running a publishing house. One exciting discovery early on was when I tracked down a copy of Thomas Hornor’s Brief Account of the Colosseum, in the Regent’s Park, 1829, in an antiquarian bookshop run by a grumpy old book- seller called Stanley Crowe o V Museum Street, near the British Museum. It contains a wonderful panorama of London, sketched by Thomas Horner from a cradle that he built on top of the dome of St Paul’s Cathedral. Paul Paget, who was then Surveyor of the Fabric of St Paul’s, kindly o V ered me the opportunity to go up onto the dome with him when it was being renovated. One of the builders working up there gave me a large square nail that he had just pulled out of the lead with his pliers. It fascinated me to think that one of Sir Christopher Wren’s workmen was the last person to touch that nail before I took it. It remains with my book collection. When I first came into publishing, it struck me that the lunch break was a complete waste of time. I decided with the journalist and writer Simon Jenkins that, during lunchtimes, we should prepare a book on the gables, pediments, turrets and other wonders above our heads. The plan was for him to produce the text and me the photo- graphs. As we both became too busy nothing happened until 2007. I then decided to complete it myself. It would be designed by our son Octavius with my text and photographs with the title London Above Eye Level . The book should really have been called A Passion for Looking Up , as it developed from my great interest in architectural detail above ground level.
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