Case 13
- The Right Book Club: Beginnings
Sir Arthur Willert, The empire in the world. A study in leadership and reconstruction. London: Oxford University Press, 1937. RBC 325.3 WIL
One of Gollancz’s book travellers was disappointed at the poor subscription uptake for a new book on economic questions and asked the bookseller why. The answer: had the book been written from a conservative standpoint, the bookseller would have ordered 10 times as many copies. Enter The Right Book Club (RBC), which began about February 1937. Although the Club was owned by William A. Foyle, of Foyle’s bookshop, London, its leading spirit was his daughter Christina (1911–1999), who acted as secretary. She was alarmed by ‘the flood of communist and semi-communist literature…pouring forth from the printing presses and threatening to engulf the saner members of the reading public.’ The RBC was started as a reaction to the leftward swing in 1930s politics in the UK, and an attempt at political renewal. Its aim and enemy were clear: to oppose and fight against Socialism, Communism and Left propaganda. It was a rival to The Left Book Club.
Rather than reinvent the wheel, Christina Foyle modelled the RBC on the Left Book Club. The typography of each book had a modern look; bindings at first were of blue cloth; members received a ‘Book of the Month’ choice; ‘Special Edition for the ‘Right’ Book Club’ was imprinted on the cover; and each title was priced at 2s 6d. There were some differences: the books were not commissioned; they were reprinted and republished politically conservative texts; and they often carried colourful book-jackets. The first RBC book was Sir Arthur Willert’s The Empire of the World, a dry academic discussion of imperial politics, which first appeared in March 1937. It was published by Oxford University Press in the same year.
Sir Arthur Willert, The empire in the world. A study in leadership and reconstruction. London: Oxford University Press, 1937. RBC 325.3 WIL
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![Laurence Housman, Victoria Regina. London: Jonathan Cape, [1937]. RBC 820 HOU](https://www.reedgallery.co.nz/__data/assets/image/0017/1045304/13b.webp)
Laurence Housman, Victoria Regina. London: Jonathan Cape, [1937]. RBC 820 HOU
This very English text on a very English and much-loved Queen was published by Jonathan Cape in 1936, priced at 10s 6d. On the cover and the verso of the ornate Ernest H. Shepherd illustrative ‘Cape’ title-page are its reprint details: ‘Special Edition for the ‘Right’ Book Club. 10 Soho Square, W.1.’ The five (sometimes six) on the RBC Selection Committee who made Housman’s Victoria Regina the ‘Book of the Month’ for July 1937 were Derek Walker-Smith, Baron Broxbourne (1910-1992), a Conservative Party politician; Norman Thwaites (1872-1956), soldier and intelligence officer; Trevor Blakemore (1879–1953), a known sympathizer of Germany and National Socialism; Anthony Ludovici (1882–1971), a Nietzschean eugenist, and antisemite; and journalist Harry Collinson Owen (1882-1956). Occasionally William Foyle had input.
W. H. Chamberlin, A false Utopia. London: Duckworth, 1937. RBC 335 CHA
William Henry Chamberlin (1897–1969) was an American historian and journalist who, when living in the Soviet Union was pro-communism, and a Marxist. He eventually changed tack, severely criticizing communism, socialism, and other forms of collectivism, all of which he felt lead to a false Utopia. This Duckworth imprint for the RBC in August 1937 was popular with Dunedin Public Library readers: from March 1938 to 6 August 1941, it was taken out or renewed 22 times.
G. Ward Price, I know these dictators. London: George Harrap, 1937. RBC 321.9 PRI
As Special Correspondent for the Daily Mail, G. Ward Price (1886–1961) had personal contact with Hitler and Mussolini, travelling with them ‘by land and sea’ and dining as their guests. To RBC readers (and others), he hoped, with objectivity and an impartial approach, to present a convincing picture of these men as human beings. Price was hardly that. He was a fascist sympathizer, supportive of the Third Reich and the Third Italian Civilisation; he ‘hero-worshipped’ Hitler, describing him as ‘a human, pleasant personality’, ‘artistic’, and ‘widely read’; he defended Germany’s iron-fist tactics against communists; and he defended the Nazi concentration camps. The writer of the jacket blurb states: ‘For the understanding of the great developments…this book is indispensable’.
Rex Welldon Finn, The English heritage. (1937). RBC 942 FIN
The RBC fiercely defended Great Britain and its social, political, economic standards – what they were, should be, and their maintenance. This stance resulted in a number of publications that were decidedly English in nature, such as Sir Arnold Wilson’s Thoughts and Talks (June 1938) and Philip Gibbs’s Ordeal in England (September 1938), a commentary on current events and a retort to Orwell and J. B Priestley. Rex W. Finn (1901-1971), an expert on the Domesday Book, wrote English Heritage, which was first published by Heinemann for 7s 6d. Foyle and her team chose this title as the RBC ‘Book of the Month’ for June 1937.
