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A review by shanaqui
A Bookshop of One's Own: How a Group of Women Set Out to Change the World by Jane Cholmeley
informative
reflective
4.0
Silver Moon was a feminist bookshop in London -- one of the first in the UK, and ultimately the largest in Europe, with the aims of showing there was a market for books for women, books about women, books about lesbians, etc, in all kinds of genres. They started out naive and hopeful, and mostly kept the hope alive through the years of downturns and bastard landlords and men coming in to wank in front of the lesbian bookshelves (really).
Jane Cholmeley was one of the founders, and this book is a little bit her memoir, and mostly the story of the bookshop. It's selective, of course, though Cholmeley tries to have her eyes open to her own faults, and muses at times on what she did wrong, or on situations she might've handled differently. It's clear that it was an important resource for many, and the support for LGBT women came at just the right time during a period where gays and lesbians needed visibility, to be given a place where they were normal, because of Thatcher's section 28.
Sometimes it's infuriating and depressing, sometimes you have to roll your eyes at the earnest naivety of two young feminists starting a bookshop with relatively little knowledge of the requirements, sometimes you just have to cheer them on. And I very much appreciated Cholmeley's self-examination, and her eagerness to include the anecdotes and perspectives of the people who worked at Silver Moon, including those which were critical.
It sounds like it was a lovely and vital place, and it made me sad for all we lost in the closing down of the bookshops (not just Silver Moon) on Charing Cross Road.
Jane Cholmeley was one of the founders, and this book is a little bit her memoir, and mostly the story of the bookshop. It's selective, of course, though Cholmeley tries to have her eyes open to her own faults, and muses at times on what she did wrong, or on situations she might've handled differently. It's clear that it was an important resource for many, and the support for LGBT women came at just the right time during a period where gays and lesbians needed visibility, to be given a place where they were normal, because of Thatcher's section 28.
Sometimes it's infuriating and depressing, sometimes you have to roll your eyes at the earnest naivety of two young feminists starting a bookshop with relatively little knowledge of the requirements, sometimes you just have to cheer them on. And I very much appreciated Cholmeley's self-examination, and her eagerness to include the anecdotes and perspectives of the people who worked at Silver Moon, including those which were critical.
It sounds like it was a lovely and vital place, and it made me sad for all we lost in the closing down of the bookshops (not just Silver Moon) on Charing Cross Road.