Section:GDN 12 PaGe:2 Edition Date:190827 Edition:01 Zone: Sent at 26/8/2019 16:23 cYanmaGentaYellowbla
- The Guardian
Tuesday 27 August 2019
Publishing’s
regrettable
rejections
Ecotherapy:
why plants are
on prescription
Ah, the heyday of publishing – big
desks, lots of cash, martini-soused
three-hour lunches, trying to
appease your government. That was
the world in which TS Eliot, then
a director of Faber and Faber , was
living in 1944, when he rejected
George Orwell’s Animal Farm for its
criticism of Stalin, Britain’s wartime
ally. “We have no conviction,” Eliot
wrote to Orwell, “that this is the
right point of view from which to
criticise the political situation at the
present time.” He did, however, say
he was “very sorry” to pass on it, as
it would likely mean Orwell wouldn’t
send them his next book – a little
novel called Nineteen Eighty- Four.
His decision has haunted the
publisher ever since. Toby Faber,
the grandson of the founder, is now
urging Faber to rectify Eliot’s bad
call by printing its own edition of the
book when it comes out of copyright
in 2020 , alongside Eliot’s rejection.
Hanging Eliot out to dry seems a
little harsh , though – he is far from
the fi rst editor to miss out on a
future bestseller. At least his letter
didn’t describe Animal Farm as “a
stupid and pointless fable in which
animals take over a farm and run it”,
as a n editor did at the US publisher
Knopf. Knopf also passed on The
Diary of Anne Frank (“a dreary
record of typical family bickering,
petty annoyances and adolescent
emotions”) and Jack Kerouac’s On
The Road ( “I don’t dig this one ” ).
Pick a popular book-club novel
of the past two decades and I’ll
give you the rejection count: The
Help (60), The Time Travel er’s Wife
(25), Still Alice (100 , according to its
author, Lisa Genova, before she self-
published ). Or anything regarded as
a classic: Joseph Heller’s Catch-22,
rejected a pleasing 22 times (“ It isPass notes Shortcuts
really not funny on any intellectual
level”). Or Frank Herbert’s Dune,
turned down 23 times before it
was picked up by a publisher that
specialised in automotive manuals.
As well as providing inspiration
for would-be writers, surely no one
loves a rejection tale more than a
bestselling author. Stephen King
collected all the rejections of his
debut Carrie, piercing the stack on
a nail on his wall. The story of Harry
Potter’s publication – 12 rejections
before the daughter of a Bloomsbury
editor spotted it on a slush pile – has
passed into legend, and JK Rowling
has also shared the rejection letters
she received while disguised as the
crime author Robert Galbraith.
We don’t know how Orwell felt
reading Eliot’s letter, but we do
know what happened after: Animal
Farm became a bestseller for
Penguin. As the animals might have
said, all mistakes are haunting, but
some are more haunting than others.
Sian CainAge: Popping up all the time.
App earance: Shiny and new.
Great. I love a good toilet. Who doesn’t?
Just don’t love them too much.
Is that possible? Sadly, it is. And now the
status toilet has begun to creep into
modern homes.
Is this one of those musical, self-opening
ones from Japan that spray you in the
fundament for an encore? Sometimes it
might be. Although the status toilet is more
about quantity than quality.
I would struggle to use more than one
toilet at a time, to be honest. Well, quite.
But according to a report in the Sunday
Times, 82% of two-bedroom homes sold
by Hamptons International last year
have at least two bathrooms, while more
than a third of four-bed homes have at
least four.
Talk about being spoiled for choice!
Indeed – and many new homes in the
US are being built with more toilets than
residents.
That seems ... odd. It seems odd to
Kevin McCloud of Grand Designs, too.
“Bathrooms are extremely wasteful in
terms of resource, yet people are putting
more in their homes than there are actual
occupants,” he said. “Four people live in
the house and put in six toilets. I don’t
understand that.”
Maybe if you’re rich it is important to
have your own personal toilet, plus a few
spares. Maybe.
Perhaps you need to have a choice , so you
can think to yourself: “ This feels like an
east-wing poo kind of day.” It is important
to follow your feelings in these matters.
The Weidlake complex of four rented party
houses in Hollywood has 32 bedrooms and
51 bathrooms, but still receives complaints
of “public urination”.
I guess it just feels right sometimes.
I guess, but Buckingham Palace has 78
toilets, just to be on the safe side. Although,
er, paying visitors can’t use any of them.
Spoilsports! Surely that would be the
main attraction. I know. It is hard for
private citizens to experience that kind of
luxury. Olga Kogan, the wife of the Russian
oligarch Valery Kogan, once hoped to
build a mansion in Connecticut with 26
bathrooms, but had to scale down her plans
to a mere 15.
Eleven toilets gone for ever! How their
oligarch pals must sneer at them. It’s very
sad, I know.
Do say: “Can you tell me which door is the
toilet, please?”
Don’t say: “Maybe it’s easier if you just tell
me which ones aren’t toilets .”No 4,036
Status toilets
The world can be a terrible,
terrifying place. We need to relax.
We need to exhale. By God, The
Repair Shop is exactly the television
show we all need. Th is BBC series
has quietly bimbled around the
schedules since 2017. It is a gorgeous
ornament of a thing. It luxuriates
in its own sleepy pace. It rewards
patience and care, and it may very
well be the most moving thing on
British television.
If you’ve seen it, you’ll know.
In a thatched barn kitted out with
bare wood and fairylights, a team
of expert craftspeople are given a
number of careworn items to repair.Why we should
all watch The
Repair Shop
Many gardeners already know the
uplifting feeling you get from being
mudd y, nurturing plants from seed
to bloom and watching the seasons
change. It is something the NHS is
increasingly taking notice of, too,
as a way to improve and manage
mental health conditions.
A GP surgery in Hulme,
Manchester, has started prescribing
gardening to people with anxiety
and depression. Patients are given
plants to care for, which are later
planted in the surgery’s communal
garden – a place where they can
join in an activity with others and
strengthen social connections.
There are other similar schemes,
such as Sydenham Garden in south
London, which takes GP referrals
for its therapeutic sessions.
“Research shows that outdoor
exercise or ‘ecotherapy’ has huge
benefi ts for wellbeing and can even
be as eff ective as antidepressants
in treating mild to moderate
depression and anxiety,” says Aimee
Gee from the charity Mind. “This is
thought to be due to a combination
of physical activity, which is known
to have many physical and mental
health benefi ts; social contact ,RR
Turned down:
George Orwell
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