伦敦书店日记：初次介绍 #SimpleEnglish

伴随益康糯米和朋友理查德在伦敦的小书店项目 Hoxton Books 的启动，文化土豆决定尝试在未来几个月尝试每月录制一期慢速简单英语的节目，记录书店的成长，也希望大部分文化土豆的听众能够跟上。这期节目是我们第一次录制，希望大家多提意见。

节目中提到的作品信息：

Bitter Sweet Symphony by The Verve

https://youtu.be/1lyu1KKwC74

为了帮助部分听众的理解，下面是 Otter.ai 制作的文字整理。（两人同时说话时错误比较多，但是基本够用！）

Yifan 0:00

Welcome to culture potato, a new hope this is a brand new, slow English speaking podcast where my friend Richard and I are going to talk about our brand new project a bookshop in London. Yay, Hi Richard!

Richard 0:19

Hello

Yifan 0:20

Could you introduce yourself to our listeners, and maybe say one interesting thing about our friendship.

Richard 0:28

So Hello, everyone. My name is Richard. I've been a friend of the fans for about 15 years. He described me as bookish because I grew up amongst lots of books. My father's in the book business. I've worked in bookshops, I've worked in publishing companies. I've even worked for my father. And I'm always always wanting to buy books and reading them. So that's roughly why I'm here.

Yifan 1:05

And I just want to add until very recently, because we have to work on this bookshop project. Richard had no internet at home.

Yeah, that's right. Indeed.

No Internet how hardcore?

Richard?

Richard 1:26

Yeah, sceptical of all the inventions after the book. So if and what's the what's the latest? Or at least how, how is the bookshop looking? How are the how's the the site progressing towards completion?

Yifan 1:43

So, I have been in this project, our division of labour or what each of us do is I have been taking charge on the decoration, buildings work of the bookshop, while Richard is preparing on the content and what books to choose.

So in the last month, I have been working with builders and interior designer on the site, our bookshop is tiny, it's about 25 or 30 at a push maybe 25 square metres somewhere in England, it's probably in square feet have no idea what what that is.

We currently have strengthened all the walls to make it stronger because we have some hanging bookshops. So we have one bookshelf that's freestanding, and two shelves are hanging so screwed on to the war. So the war needs to be able to bear heavy weight strong. Yeah, yeah. The builders have put plaster on the war now so it's now painted white. But we are going to paint it give it another coat of paint. So we have been choosing paint colours over the last week. I forget what colour we have settled on.

Richard 3:11

I think it was called something like ash grey. And what was it?

Yifan 3:15

No that's for the floor.

Richard 3:17

No. As Gray 's for the wall and for the full floor was a good light

Cree or something

Yifan 3:24

scree

Richard 3:24

scree.

Yifan 3:25

Okay, so we have a concrete looking floor and we have a bluish I think it's not is it gray to me Yes. blueish wall anyway. Yeah. yet to be done are lights, installing spotlights and a hanging pendant light in the middle. That looks like a book actually. You haven't seen them.

Richard 3:51

I've only seen photos. Okay, it was very nice. very tasteful.

Yifan 3:56

That's half of our budget

Richard 3:57

as as as is to be expected from you.

Yifan 4:00

And then I have ordered the checkout machine. So it's like an iPod iPad? No, it's like an iPhone thing where people can swipe their credit card or contactless card and I'm hoping to get alipay and WeChat pay a machine to do that as well because there are a lot of Chinese students in London who may benefit from that or we may benefit from that.

Richard 4:24

We may right.

Yifan 4:27

What else is to be done? I think the toilet Yeah, we have a small toilet and the toilet needs to be

Richard 4:34

very important. Especially with Coronavirus with water. There are no public glues, no public toilets,

Yifan 4:42

but maybe we shouldn't say that we have a toilet. It's not a public toilet.

Richard 4:46

There's no McDonald's but otherwise we can't.

Yifan 4:48

When people ask we have no toilet.

Richard 4:50

People ask us, we have no toilets, but we definitely need

Yifan 4:53

your listener for culture potato Okay, so this Is our shop our shop is in an in an area called Hoxton. That's h o x to n. Hoxton. That's in East London. So Richard, why don't you you are a West Londoner, tell us about an East London and Hoxton.

Richard 5:15

Yeah, I was actually born not very far from the shot but by the time I was four years old, my parents moved west. But yeah, it was the West London is where, you know, typically is thought of more affluent than the east and so forth. So East London, Hoxton, traditionally a working class part of London. Nowadays, like with all these, like a lot of former working class areas in major European cities, they're undergoing a lot of change a lot of what people call gentrification and Hoxton is not immune to that. It's also one thing. It's

Yifan 5:59

a pioneer of

Richard 6:01

Yeah, could even be considered a pioneer. Definitely. And yeah, probably in London, it would be a pioneer. Of course, in the 90s, late 90s, when Britpop was all the rage, the famous clip, the video clip of the Verves, unfinished sin, no, not unfinished with any, a bittersweet Symphony. Sorry, a bittersweet Symphony by the verb. Were you land that's a band, right? And this singer is walking down Hoxton Street, barging into people. But at least he's not making way for anybody else. He's just walking down in the straight line. Anyway, that's that's a link to that video, I'll post a link I definitely will post a link to the video. And that is Hoxton. And that street probably not changed that much. So just a few more hipster new places. hipster new I don't know. Yeah, they hit the places I don't know. Definitely weren't there when the video was shot. But otherwise, it probably retains a similar feel.

Yifan 7:09

There's a very famous British person laying rest nearby our bookshop. Our address is 99 East road about five minutes walk up, say 10 minutes walk at most. We have

Richard 7:23

we have the bunhill is it bunhill Cemetery. Yes. Or bunhill fields where William Blake is buried. And is that Daniel Defoe as well?

Yifan 7:38

of Treasure Island.

Richard 7:40

No he's of Robinson Robinson Crusoe. Yes. Different Island. Yeah. Yeah, and I feel like there's somebody else we're missing out. Anyway, Daniel Defoe, and obviously William Blake will do for for a bookshop.

Yifan 7:57

That's where we will be having our sandwiches during lunch

Richard 8:00

break. Exactly. That's where we'll be. lunch breaks. Look forward to look forward to at one point so at one point, we you thought of calling or referring to it as the podcast bookshop, can you elucidate

Yifan 8:20

it is the date that was my idea. And nobody understood the idea. It was a much misunderstood idea. I might still launch a campaign to to make it our tagline, the podcast bookshop,

Richard 8:35

Hoxton books, the podcast bookshop,

Yifan 8:37

okay, because I think there is a idea that people who love the internet and social media who stay on Weibo WeChat all the time they don't read books. And books is for bookish people who are you know, who have no internet had home here?

Richard 8:54

no internet, no to sceptical of everything that was invented after the book.

Yifan 8:59

Yeah. And that concept is very strange to me. Because I have in obviously been the next journalist or somewhat, probably still working in the field that's related to journalism. I love books and social media, because our job is essentially transferring knowledge from books to social media. And in in Chinese, we call this brick carrying, right so a lot of marketing people and journalists writers, their job is essentially book carry a brick carrying, carrying but either from the English speaking world to the Chinese world, or from the book to more popular fields. Yeah. And also, I think podcast is a medium where you really engage with the content like you do with a book. You spend hours on it.

Richard 9:53

That's it. It's sort of like an individual.

Yifan 9:55

Yes. Yeah. Very private.

Richard 9:58

Yeah, private thing. Exactly.

Yifan 10:00

And so I think they, they go together. And I take book recommendations from a lot of podcasters. So I thought, you know, why don't we use this as an angle for our book, bookshop? And because you need a unique selling point nowadays? Well, yeah.

Richard 10:18

What's the last book you? You read for, or at least the last book you opened that was recommended to you by, by podcast?

Yifan 10:28

Um, can I talk about the next one? So the next. The next one is, it's a very, it's a cookbook by Ottolenghi and his collaborator, one of his collaborators

Richard 10:40

here. Is is his husband, the Palestinian? Yeah. Was he called cesifo? Sami?

Yifan 10:47

No. So it's someone else. Maybe someone I need to meet me, but it's like it's it's about vegetarian cooking and vegetables. Okay. And I heard it on kcrw the goodfood. Bought it yesterday. And I thought, well, Okay, very good. That so that was the next one. previous one. The thing is, since I started the book club project for cultural potatoes, and my nonfiction project, unpack. I have no time to read other. I have no,

Richard 11:20

so a lot of projects you've got going on.

Yifan 11:23

No, it's just with this A New Hope it's just four because they are financing the bookshop? Yeah, so each each week I do a different thing. That is to say so my podcast listening has decreased the time I spent on podcast. Sure, we have opportunities to recommend other podcasts plenty. The next question I want to ask you is obviously you know, London's bookshops the best So looking at our competitors are not necessarily competitors. tell our listeners or three independent bookshops that you love.

Richard 12:03

Okay, so first of all, we're selling starting we'll start with Daunt's that's the most obvious one because they're almost like I mean, they are independent but they're like a mini chain as well because they got quite a few they were four or five bookshops in London, mostly in the West and the North. The the the flagship shop in Marylebone is essentially based on well essentially grew out of a travel bookshop and they still categorise their books by country

Yifan 12:38

like a Lonely Planet? travel books or travel literature.

Richard 12:42

Well travel literature, so they've Yeah, they do in the sense that under each country, you find guides, like you know, Lonely Planet, etc, you'll have books about the history of that place, and writers from there or when he's in translation, but the major writers from that place, so in a way you'd have History Fiction, and guidebooks or all mixed together by country, if that makes sense.

Yifan 13:18

I love Daunt's, but somehow they are the least, they are almost the opposite to the way I would imagine our shop. I don't know why.

Richard 13:28

Yes, we're definitely probably wouldn't be doing much by country. I don't know. Unless...,

Yifan 13:35

but also they have a very English cottage.

Richard 13:39

Yeah, there's something quite Yeah, there's something quite traditional or exactly quite cottagey very English. Maybe what we could say a bit. how likely are you?

Yifan 13:49

I like how you said your English your French accent surfaced. Richard is half French

Richard 14:01

I'm half French? But um yeah, it feels quite quite

Yifan 14:07

safe maybe twee is the

Richard 14:10

yeah tweet by twee at an effort Yeah, how how accurate what it's great though it's great if obviously like you know people who come from abroad love going then it's because it's it's very I don't know if pittoresque is the word but

probably have the most visible tote bag

Oh, yeah. They've got the they got the whole they got the pioneers they send throughout the world with their tote bags. Yeah. Referencing themselves. Yeah. They you know, people buy the travel books that they get the tote bag, they travel elsewhere. bag.

Yifan 14:50

So it's a long standing tradition.

Richard 14:53

Exactly. Yeah. Must be.

Yifan 14:57

Okay, number two, choice number two

Richard 14:59

Probably a bookshop that's not very far from where, from where Hoxton books is, and that's the Broadway bookshop on Broadway market. And that said, I mean, that's a, you know, relatively small shop. But with the space they have, they do very well with filling it with books, or at least books that I would love to read. And there's not much you know, when we talk about separating the wheat from the chaff. I'd say there's not, there isn't much chaff in that bookshop. Um,

Yifan 15:39

why is this so many agricultural metaphors in English and separating the sheep from The what?

Richard 15:49

The wheat from the chaff?

Yifan 15:50

Yeah, but also people say,

Richard 15:52

separating sheep and white sheep and black sheep.

Yifan 15:55

No man from the sheep. I don't know. Yes, yes.

Richard 15:59

Yes. Lamb dressed as mutton.

Yifan 16:02

Is that all yours? No, never mind Skinner. Forward, but I would recommend, you know, like, visitors to London to check out Broadway market. It's probably not in any guidebook. And yet, it's probably the most London in a way. I don't know, young London, hipster.

Richard 16:23

Young London is very young. Do you want to see

Yifan 16:26

how young people in London live

Richard 16:30

and get a Broadway market? In a idealised? Yeah.

Yifan 16:34

I mean, it's true. There's a lot of self love is definitely a lot of self love.

Richard 16:40

Yeah, there's Yeah, they Yeah. Yeah. They're very pleased with themselves. Yes. But definitely the bookshop is great. And the bookshop has been there a while. Yeah, I really don't have a bad word to say about them. Another bookshop I find interesting is in Chelsea, in West London, you know, very affluent area. And that's Sandoe's. Then, like, the ceilings are so low, there's maybe two floors. Yeah, there's two floors, low ceilings, books stacked everywhere. except they're all new books. So you could you know, you imagine that kind of bookshop, imagine selling secondhand books, where they've just have all these secondhand books, and I don't know where to put them. Here. It's all new books. They're all stacked everywhere. Lots of art books. You know, big, big expensive art books that people in Chelsea will buy coffee table books, coffee table books. Yeah, but not too not too frivolous coffee table books like serious coffee table books, okay. And and then they like to you they stack so on their tables, they like stacking books by author. So for instance, you might have like, you might have Philip Roth and all his books are on top of each other on a table. Okay. So different titles they mix them up. So you'd like you unwind the pie or to find the entire oevre the particular writer.

Yifan 18:14

So how is Broadway because you mentioned don'ts in their flagship travel shop. Things are organised by country right like the geography department. And then in in Sandoe's, Sanders is is called Sandel's or Sandoe's. Sandoe.

Richard 18:32

the with an apostrophe s at the end. Sandoe's?

Yifan 18:36

Yeah, they are organised by author.

Richard 18:40

Yes. And then but they have a more traditional way of running things by sort of, you know, fiction, and fiction A to Zed, but then when you look on the tables, they'll have like, it's a bit like I'm not saying it's messy. But they can also like, yeah, you might find fit on the shelf and Philip Roth, it might be one or two books, but then if you look on the table, there might be more there. So it's a bit random says maybe a bit random.

Yifan 19:07

Yeah, and what about in Broadway, but books,

Richard 19:10

Broadway bookshop is oh? Yeah, no, they also like the country thing, where if you look under France, you have find books about France, as well as books by French writers. Yeah, which is how it should have described don't earlier, and how are you going to organise boxing our bookshop?

So how we're going to organise them? Well, either by service, all sorts of I think there are sorts of all sorts of ways and they might intersect in different ways. So we might have a shelf with books recommended by certain people. Books might also figure in

so we're talking about Obama's reading list.

Yeah, so we could talk about Obama's reading list. But that Like, you know, there might be one or two things there that double up with, say, a shelf full of books by people who write for The New Yorker. Yeah. As well as maybe we'd have books on certain topics there might intersect with the book kinda know to do with to do with black lives matter for instance. Okay.

Yifan 20:20

No podcast. Sorry. No.

Richard 20:24

Yeah, of course. Yeah. podcast. podcasts are your thing the podcasts?

Yifan 20:29

Right, so

Richard 20:30

yeah, definitely like yeah, for instance. I mean, it start the week is the the obvious one when it comes to at least nonfiction books.

Yifan 20:38

Yeah, that's a popular UK BBC Radio Show. That's also a podcast. Yeah. Anyway, right. Okay.

Richard 20:47

You've stopped me there.

Yifan 20:48

But one night, we might talk about you know, this more in detail in in a future episodes. Yes, exactly. That's

Richard 20:55

Yeah, exactly. How are we going to how we're going to categorise and now we're going to shelve everything is by almost recommendations, different products from different places. Yeah, exactly. recommendations, but yeah, from different sources. See how that pans out? How see how how we manage that?

Yifan 21:17

Yeah. Okay, more More on that in a future episode. And also, I think our listeners, this is going to be a simple English slow English, a shorter programme that we're hoping to. So in future episodes of A New Hope. One week we might talk about our bookshelves and other week we might talk about our book lists, whatever you want to hear about our Hoxton books, bookshop, let us know and then we'll try to talk about it. And lastly, for today, can you that is Richard recommend a podcast and perhaps in English podcast you like?

Richard 22:01

Okay, so thinking about this I'm going to go for a podcast which is completely just different. In fact, maybe a lot of people who are into books or read books are not necessarily interested in, ie football so this is a podcast about English football where these various supporters mostly younger I mean, youngest guys you support different team gather around the television watching a premier league game, but they end up just talking about football so they don't they comment on the game a bit. So last Sunday, it was the North London Derby between Arsenal and Tottenham, but most of the time they're just Yeah, they're just talking to each other about various things going on in in with football, and it lasts for about three hours or something. You can think you can even catch him on Twitch live but then they also release a podcast

Yifan 23:07

that's a highly technical term coming from someone who is not very technical twitch

Richard 23:11

twitch yeah twitch I'm yeah, I'm with I'm with the twitch kids, except that to them. My understanding is twitches, just people playing video games. In this case, they're watching football, and they're just reacting to what's going on. Either during the match or, or more widely. And they're the fun bunch. They're their ragtag collection. So different supporters. So there's one guy you know, who support Liverpool and other guys supports Chelsea, then they have a guest on depending on the one of the teams that's playing. And yeah, they they joke around and, and they kind of like kind of people I don't hear about my life. I don't really know many people who support football, even though I live in England. So it's just it's just refreshing. Basically. Okay, so you're up to date with what's going on in world of football.

Yifan 24:07

Okay, and very Lastly, Richard before we say goodbye, this month. The new word A New Hope. Okay, this is our finishing segment. tell our listeners a fun English word that they may not know.

Richard 24:28

Okay, sure. So we have a word, which is probably the informal to mean food.

Yifan 24:35

Like,

do you want food?

Richard 24:37

Like I'm starving? Let's have some grub. grub grub said that spelled GRUB grub? Not sure what the origin is but definitely loads a lot at least London term understood by all have some grasp, but it's also at the If you combine it with the word street grub Street, the grub street refers to aspiring writers, poets trying to make a living in the 19th century. And grub Street was a street not very far from our bookshop, in fact, also close to where William Blake and Daniel differ we mentioned we're buried. So this street no longer exists, but it was around there. And it was just a sort of bohemian place where where writers poets, aspiring journalists

Yifan 25:44

lived or so some general term you can say grubstreet to refer to them collectively Yeah, like to

Richard 25:51

Yeah, that is a column I think in pro in the satirical magazine Private Eye This is a comment column about sort of the world of journalists and basic facts Yeah. And the the column is called grubstreet. That's too many words hacks.

Yifan 26:07

Okay. Let's Let's hit stop and have some takeaway grub, does it even work?

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