It's Book Break's first pub crawl!
Cheers.
I'm here with the lovely Sanne from booksandquills.
Hi.
And we are going to go all around London's most literary pubs today.
And if you want to follow along, I will put a link to our route below in the description
box, so you can go and see where we're going to visit.
We're starting here, this is The Flask in Highgate.
And we're following in the footsteps of a lot of poets who used to come here, like John
Keats.
They have this old tradition called Swearing on the Horns.
And we know that definitely Byron took part in it, I don't know for sure that Keats did,
but I'm going to say he probably did.
Yeah, probably.
Him and Shelley probably came here together.
So we couldn't get the real horns that they used here today, so instead, I've got some
Perfect replacement
Makeshift horns
All right, how do we swear on these horns?
So, we're going to swear that you will drink only strong beer, unless you like weak beer
better.
OK, I will drink only strong beer, unless I like weak beer better.
And you will eat only white bread, unless you like brown bread better.
I will only eat white bread, unless I like brown bread better.
That is a tongue twister!
We've done it! We've followed in the footsteps of Keats and Byron.
To the next location!
Cheers.
Let's go!
And just round the corner from The Flask, don't miss The Spaniard's Inn, which has a
great literary history of its own.
It's actually mentioned in The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens, and it was a favourite
of Bram Stoker, the author of Dracula.
In fact, it's even rumoured that he based some of this story off ghost stories he heard
from his time spent in this pub.
This is The Jerusalem Tavern, which a very important literary figure used to call his
local: Dr Johnson, the writer of the first modern English dictionary.
But while we're here, I thought we could play a Dr Johnson themed game.
Yep.
So, thanks to the dictionary, we now know the definitions of all sorts of words.
So have you ever played Balderdash before?
I have not.
OK, it's a great game where we're going to look through the dictionary, but I have got
a little list here of weird words you might not have heard of from the dictionary.
Look up the meanings, and write down both the real meaning and some fake answers.
And we're both going to do it, and then see if we can pick the right answer from each
other's list.
I'm going to be really bad at this, but I'll try.
We'll give it a go.
OK, so my word is, I don't know if this is how it's pronounced: Googwaruck.
Googwaruck.
How do you spell that?
Think Google, goog.
Goog.
Waruck.
OK.
OK, so is that:
A wise man who would come in for town disputes.
OK, a googwaruck.
A tool used for wood carving.
OK, a googwaruck.
Or a type of bird from Australia.
Ooh, a googwaruck.
I feel like they all make sense.
I really like the idea that it's an Australian bird, but I feel like that's because I'm thinking
of a cookaburra.
I'm going to say googwaruck is a man who was called in for town disputes.
Incorrect, it is the bird.
No!!
That was a good one, OK.
So you get a point, I have to buy you a drink.
OK, perfect.
Right, my word that I picked is piblockto.
Piblockto.
OK.
Yep.
So, is piblockto, number one:
The feeling of knowing a word on the tip of your tongue but not remembering it.
OK.
Piblockto.
Yep.
Number two, drinking before noon.
Or number three, the condition when a dog gets exposed to cold weather and goes into
a frenzy.
That last one.
Yeah it is that one.
Is that right? Yeah!
Great, OK, shall we go on to our next location?
Yep, let's go.
The next stop on our map is one of London's most popular literary pubs, but this, Ye Olde
Cheshire Cheese, famously don't allow any filming inside.
So I can't actually show you around, but we're just going to have a little peer down this
alley, and think about quite how many literary figures have walked down here before:
Mark Twain, Alfred Lord Tennyson, Arthur Conan Doyle, and PG Wodehouse were all apparently
regulars here.
And, Charles Dickens even gives directions to it in A Tale of Two Cities.
Down Ludgate Hill to Fleet Street, and so up a covered way into a tavern.
Well this is that tavern.
But for now we're going past it onto our next stop.
This is The French House.
So this place has got some great history.
Charles de Gaulle is believed to have written his speech here in this pub rallying the French
people.
But it's also got some literary connections.
Yep.
Dylan Thomas was here, and he actually apparently left his manuscript of Under Milkwood under
his chair, here in the pub.
He forgot it?
He forgot it. And left it behind. And then I guess he got it back.
Yeah.
Because it now exists.
And they also are famous for another thing which is that they only sell half pints, so
that's what I've got here, you've got a cider.
A French cider.
Ooh very appropriate.
Cheers.
Cheers!
So we're going to play a game, talking of Dylan Thomas, we're going to play a poetry
game here.
OK, I'm not good at poetry.
No, me neither, so this might, you know, we'll see how this turns out.
So start off by just writing one line, and then we're going to swap, and then we'll go
from there.
OK.
I'm scared.
OK, ready? OK, so.
We're going to swap poems, and now we're going to write the line to finish off that couplet,
and then fold over and then start a new couplet.
OK, yes.
Ooh, you did go for a hard one to rhyme with.
I'm sorry!
I've given you a hard one to rhyme with now.
How can I rhyme with this word?
I know.
This is horrible.
OK, shall we swap to read them out.
OK, oh no.
We're sharing a morning with literary heroes Compared to them we're just a couple of zeroes
Well I am at least, Sanne will soon be famous We simply can't help it, you musn't blame
us.
Ooh, good rhyme.
After watching our tour, we hope you're inspired To follow in their footsteps, before you're
old and tired.
That's really good!
I like it!
That was good. OK.
In the French House on a summer's day London's great poets come out to play
They found inspiration and a pint or two But when they drunk too much they needed the
loo That's why the French House only serves half
glasses So hopefully we won't embarrass ourselves
in front of anyone who passes
I love that! I feel like they both worked really well
We now have contributed to the literary canon of this place.
Excellent.
These poems will probably be famous now.
100%
Now we're just going to finish off our drink, before we go to our final destination.
Salut!
So, where are we heading next?
We are off to our final destination, The George Inn.
This is a very Shakespearean pub.
I'm very excited.
Have you been there before?
No, I haven't, so I haven't been to any of the places that we've been to today.
Oh great! I'm so pleased.
And I've lived in London for six years.
This one's really cool, like looks very old and literary. You just go there and you're
like, Shakespeare probably was here.
Perfect.
So cheers to our final destination.
Cheers! We've switched to gin and tonic.
So this is the George Inn, and this is possibly the most literary pub in all of London, it's
got so many amazing connections.
Number one being Shakespeare.
So Shakespeare, I can't say he definitely came here, apparently there's actually no
documented proof of any of the pubs that he went to, so we don't know anything, but he
very very probably came here.
And there's a historian called Pete Brown who's written a book about this pub called
Shakespeare's Local.
And he said in the book, or in interviews about the book, that he would bet the entire
contents of his drinks cellar that Shakespeare did have a pint here, at some point.
All right.
So I feel like, I want to believe that.
We'll take it, yeah.
And probably had, there's like a lovely courtyard outside, probably had his plays performed
out there.
I brought a lovely book with me of Shakespeare's sonnets.
How lovely, can I?
Yeah, have a look. There were probably people reciting those here at some point.
So that's like number one.
A few hundred years down the line, Charles Dickens also definitely knew about this place,
because he's mentioned it by name in Little Dorrit, and there's a fictionalised version
of what's clearly this pub in Our Mutual Friend.
So he definitely knows it.
Charles Dickens just went all over town, to all the pubs.
I think he went everywhere!
There's one that's so nearly a really cool literary story.
So Chaucer started writing The Canterbury Tales next door.
There used to be a different pub next door, and that's where he wrote it.
But that pub like doesn't exist anymore!
So basically -
I think that's my favourite though, I love a bit of Chaucer.
Oh and also I do have one more fact.
There is a poet called John Mennes, and he wrote a poem all about getting too drunk at
The George and being sick.
So, that's maybe the best of all of them.
It's just very well documented.
Yeah.
People love it here.
So we have been quite a few of the best literary pubs so far.
There's so many more.
There's The Grapes in Limehouse, which is actually mentioned in Picture of Dorian Gray,
that's a good one.
Oh, I didn't realise that.
Yeah, I love that they're mentioned by names in books, that's really fun.
I think a lot of these books I read when I was at school, before I lived in London, and
I wouldn't have picked up on them
Wouldn't have recognised them
So it would be cool to read them now and be like oh I've drunk there, I've had a gin and
tonic there.
Which has been your favourite of the places we've been?
I actually think this is probably the nicest one.
It's also really nice and sunny outside, you can see the beautiful light here.
It's really big, and I mean so many famous people have been here.
Yeah.
Got to be the favourite.
You feel like you're walking in their footsteps.
So that was Book Break's first ever pub crawl, but do leave us a comment below letting us
know your favourite bookish location that we haven't been to yet. Always looking for
more places to go visit.
And of course, do go follow Sanne, I will link to her YouTube channel in the description
box below.
And you can also follow us over on Instagram @bookbreakuk, and I'll post all of our fun
behind the scenes stuff over there.
Thanks so much for having me, it's been very fun.
It has, it's been a great day. Cheers again!
Cheers.
And give this video a thumbs up if you liked it, and of course hit that subscribe button
below for new videos every week.
Coming up next week we've got a video all about books about obsession.
See you next time! Bye