The true spirit of the Great British Pub

Astute readers of this magazine may have noticed that I have a new book out.

I’ve been really trying not to plug it, but my fellow columnist Roger Protz gave it a warm review last week. You’ve probably decided whether or not you’re going to buy it on the strength of that (ah, go on, you know you want to), so I don’t want to twist your arm about this ideal Christmas gift any further, but would like to reflect on what the process of writing a book about the history of one pub — and touring to promote it — has taught me about the pub now, and in the future.

As I write, I’m arranging to be interviewed for a forthcoming piece in Esquire magazine about ‘the death of the pub’. It’s a topic I’m asked about frequently, especially whenever the new figures on pub closures are released.

And I’ve said this before, but I always prefer to be resolutely optimistic about this.

The industry faces some truly stinking issues, and I would hate to be the tenant or lessee of a community pub owned by a pub company right now. It must be a bitter and frustrating experience.

But when I look at the George Inn, Southwark (yes, the subject of my new book) I become surer than ever that the pub will survive. Over six centuries, the George has had just about everything you can imagine thrown at it. It’s risen from the ashes after having been burned to the ground (twice). It has grown and then shrunk in size as its usage changed to meet the requirements of different centuries with their different modes of transport.

In lawless Southwark, populated by thieves, rogues, whores, violent bare-knuckle fighters, conmen and vagabonds, it survived levels of debauchery and villainy that make the imagined town-centre terrors of Sir Ian Gilmore and Professor David Nutt seem like an afternoon tea party on Sophie Dahl’s lawn.

And it also survived joyless puritans who make the likes of Ian Gilmore and David Nutt seem like balanced people who know how to enjoy themselves.

It survived the coming of the railways, which wiped out the stage coaching business at a stroke. It survived the near-prohibition of the First World War and the blitz of the Second, which flattened everything around it. And it survived incompetent management by owners who couldn’t give a toss about the pub and the people who ran it.

Today it thrives. And it’s not the only one.
I’m touring the country to promote the book, turning up anywhere I’m invited and where enough people want to come along to make it worthwhile. I’m speaking in town halls and theatres and bookshops and breweries, but more than anything, I’m speaking in pubs. And these pubs reinforce the points made in the book, each in their own way.

Up in Newcastle last week, I spoke in the Free Trade Inn, a pub that’s gone so long without a refurb that some of the graffiti in the toilets is written in Middle English. Some punters have drunk in there every day for 30 years. Others have discovered it more recently, after the new, ambitious young licensee kept the careworn environment but introduced an incredible array of real ales and (other kinds of) craft beers.

The following day the redoubtable Tony Brookes of Head of Steam showed me round some of his pubs in Newcastle and Gateshead. Each one was different. Each was perfectly suited to its location, its microclimate. But each sang with passion and commitment, a sense that here was a business where everyone involved cared passionately about it, about the beers and the consumers.  The Central in Gateshead was inspirational, a reinvention of a dive that restored a magnificent and unique building to its former glory.

That evening, I was at the Rat in Anick, Northumberland, which had been taken over by the local bookshop for my event. The place was packed. A local brewer was there to talk through the beers he had provided for the event. Gorgeous bar snacks were served after I’d finished speaking. The bookshop sold out of books, and we were invited round to someone’s house for a roast leg of lamb afterwards!

The Rat embodies the ideal of the rural community pub, just as the Central or the Free Trade does the urban boozer.

There will always be a need to campaign about the gross injustices and perils facing the pub. But we should never forget to spread the word about what makes the pub great.

That’s all we need to do to ensure this greatness continues.