For most of August I am spoilt for choice in Clubland.
My club closes allowing the staff to enjoy a holiday and the rolling maintenance programme to proceed after a fashion; the north wall of the coffee room has had a damp problem for as long as I have been a member. Anyway, while we are closed the following clubs allow me to visit: Buck’s, the Caledonian, the Cavalry & Guards, the Travellers’, the City of London, the Savile, the East India, the Naval & Military, the Oriental and White’s.
Yesterday I took a friend to the Savile for lunch and he thought, correctly, I might enjoy Behind Closed Doors. It is a popular title; you will remember Hugo Vickers’ biography of the Duchess of Windsor has the same title. Charles Graves’ Leather Armchairs (1963) and Anthony Lejeune’s The Gentlemen’s Clubs of London, both also welcome gifts as it happens, are excellent reference books. Seth Alexander Thévoz takes a different line.
I have just read Simon Kuper’s Chums: How a Tiny Caste of Oxford Tories Took Over the UK. Seth’ s previous club book is Club Government: How the Early Victorian World was Ruled from London Clubs. I have not read the latter but although the former has some juicy tales it ultimately left a taste of sour grapes. Behind Closed Doors is not, at least so far – I am on page 65 – judgemental. It explores the origins of London clubs and the reasons for their existence; their evolution and ups and downs until the present day. It is, if you will, a sociological history of clubs, linking their fortunes to social change, politics and business. Seth is well qualified in these subjects. He read History and Politics at Clare College Cambridge; Modern History at King’s College, London and took a Phd at Warwick on the 19th century political impact of London clubs.
Behind Closed Doors has, so far, no scandalous revelations but it does knit together the development and evolution of clubs into a cohesive and cogent tapestry. It is not dull because it is larded with a lot of good club stories, some garnered from Graves and Lejeune.
Delighted to see that Maja was awarded a photo credit for the photographs of the Savile Bar. She is the extremely pleasant and efficient person with whom the P G Wodehouse Society deals when arranging its regular social events in the Drawing Room. Non-PGWSociety members are most welcome to attend our meetings.