It was lovely to see a Little Toller book in Waterstones today and even more so when the author was Iain Sinclair. Waterstones tend to sell the same two titles by Sinclair which is always disappointing but Kudos to their Sheffield branch for this one.

Little Toller Books are an independent publisher specialising in nature writing both old and new. They have republished many classics and happily, they haven’t followed the likes of Waterstones with considerable price increases.

Regulars to this site will know I am a long standing fan of Iain Sinclair; poet, film-maker, essayist and the author of travelogues and the leading voice of British psychogeography for decades. Whilst London has predominantly been his place of wanderings, this book sees him return to the Gower Peninsula and his childhood in South Wales.

In typical Sinclair fashion the narrative jumps from one reference to another in rarely a straight line. A wanderer both off the page and on it, Sinclair weaves a memoir with literary and historical detours of which the poets Dylan Thomas and Vernon Watkins occupy a sizeable portion. I enjoyed his portrayal of Watkins in particular and the life he led compared to Thomas and how Watkins featured in Sinclair’s own life and the associated threads Sinclair ties together to form the basis of the book.

Few writers capture the landscape of memory like Sinclair; armed only with an envelope of old postcards and monochrome photographs he set about a series of walks over old stomping grounds to recapture a moment here and a memory there. Alongside the poets there are the Black Apples paintings of Ceri Richards from the 1950s, nods to William Blake, Alan Moore and the Pagan historian Ronald Hutton.

This then, is a homage of sorts to Watkins, the Poet of Gower, Sinclair is joined by his wife, Anna as he searches the town to see if his memories of meeting Watkins still hold true and it was Anna, quite by accident who found the memorial slab he was searching for: Vernon Watkins- 1906-1967. Poet of Gower: I have been taught the script of the stones and I know the tongue of the wave. The quote taken from his work Taliesin of Gower.

Reading Sinclair is akin to walking with him in real time; the side streets of memory exposed by the retelling of an old story or a chance encounter along the way. Sinclair keeps memories alive, particularly those who never quite made it but left behind a body of work and/or memories that helped shape a place most of us take for granted.

Further reading by Iain Sinclair

London Orbital

Liquid City

Lud Heat, Fifty Years On

Ghost Milk

My Favourite London Devils