Blog Tracker
18-07-2016, 09:35
Visit the Boak and Bailey's Beer Blog site (http://boakandbailey.com/2016/07/defining-classic-pub/)
We recently exchanged a few Tweets with pub blogger Martin Taylor (https://retiredmartin.com/) (AKA @NHS_Martin (https://twitter.com/NHS_Martin)) about his term*‘classic pub’ — what does it mean? Does such a thing exist?There is the abstract idea of the perfect or ideal pub, explored most famously in George Orwell’s rather over-quoted 1946 essay*‘The Moon Under Water’ (http://theorwellprize.co.uk/george-orwell/by-orwell/essays-and-other-works/the-moon-under-water/), and at*length in a book it inspired,*The Search for the Perfect Pub*by Paul Moody and Robin Turner, published in 2011 (https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0068PHRES/). Moody and Turner conclude that perfect pubs are those that possess
individuality, wit and wisdom… which fly the flag for independence in the face of corporate domination and the onset of a homogenised ‘clone town’ Britain: the ones which feed the community yet give back in double measures, at happy hour prices.
We reckon that in this context,*perfect and*classic are synonymous — both imply a quality that bears reflection, that goes beyond mere function, and to which the drinker has a reaction deep in the soul.
The thing is, Orwell tried to draw up a set of rules — no music, cheap food, pink mugs, and so on — but that’s a flawed approach because it just invites a different kind of homogeneity, and homogeneity (as Moody and Turner suggest) is the enemy of character, which is what*causes a pub to latch on to your heart.
http://i2.wp.com/boakandbailey.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Hunters-Inn-Devon-3.jpg?resize=600%2C376Inside the Hunter’s Inn, Devon.On the whole, we prefer pubs with lots of dark corners, but there are pubs which have that but that*we don’t like at all, and pubs with bright open spaces, chrome and stripped wood that (against the odds, perhaps) we love. We’ve fallen for pubs with food, and pubs without; pubs with jukeboxes, and those as silent as monasteries; crowded pub, quiet pubs; Olde Inns, new builds; round the corner from our house, or on holiday; full of friendly locals, or big-city-aloof. And so on.
Where this conversation so often goes wrong is in the idea that only pubs that match the observers’ particular preferences (which might take a decade of therapy to understand) are Proper Pubs — TRUE pubs. But pubs have been all sorts of things mixed up and inter-mingled since they faded into existence over the course of a few centuries — wine, beer, gin, food, music, art, theatre, children, bareboards, plush furnishings, cut glass, spit and sawdust — you name it. They’re all part of what is and has been The Pub.
http://i1.wp.com/boakandbailey.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/star_inn_window.jpg?resize=500%2C670
And when we talk to people for whom a post-war prefab was the Local, their memories are as fond as yours might be of a favourite Victorian corner pub or distant craft beer bar.
Ultimately, for us, the only defining feature of a pub is that we can walk in off the street without making an appointment and drink a beer or two without eating. (And, we suppose, without being made to feel guilty for not eating either.)*Beyond that, what defines the meaning of Pub is its diversity, and what makes for a classic pub is*that it gets to you, that you remember it and (optional?) that you find yourself longing to go back.
Defining a ‘Classic Pub’ (http://boakandbailey.com/2016/07/defining-classic-pub/) originally posted at Boak & Bailey's Beer Blog (http://boakandbailey.com)
More... (http://boakandbailey.com/2016/07/defining-classic-pub/)
We recently exchanged a few Tweets with pub blogger Martin Taylor (https://retiredmartin.com/) (AKA @NHS_Martin (https://twitter.com/NHS_Martin)) about his term*‘classic pub’ — what does it mean? Does such a thing exist?There is the abstract idea of the perfect or ideal pub, explored most famously in George Orwell’s rather over-quoted 1946 essay*‘The Moon Under Water’ (http://theorwellprize.co.uk/george-orwell/by-orwell/essays-and-other-works/the-moon-under-water/), and at*length in a book it inspired,*The Search for the Perfect Pub*by Paul Moody and Robin Turner, published in 2011 (https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0068PHRES/). Moody and Turner conclude that perfect pubs are those that possess
individuality, wit and wisdom… which fly the flag for independence in the face of corporate domination and the onset of a homogenised ‘clone town’ Britain: the ones which feed the community yet give back in double measures, at happy hour prices.
We reckon that in this context,*perfect and*classic are synonymous — both imply a quality that bears reflection, that goes beyond mere function, and to which the drinker has a reaction deep in the soul.
The thing is, Orwell tried to draw up a set of rules — no music, cheap food, pink mugs, and so on — but that’s a flawed approach because it just invites a different kind of homogeneity, and homogeneity (as Moody and Turner suggest) is the enemy of character, which is what*causes a pub to latch on to your heart.
http://i2.wp.com/boakandbailey.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Hunters-Inn-Devon-3.jpg?resize=600%2C376Inside the Hunter’s Inn, Devon.On the whole, we prefer pubs with lots of dark corners, but there are pubs which have that but that*we don’t like at all, and pubs with bright open spaces, chrome and stripped wood that (against the odds, perhaps) we love. We’ve fallen for pubs with food, and pubs without; pubs with jukeboxes, and those as silent as monasteries; crowded pub, quiet pubs; Olde Inns, new builds; round the corner from our house, or on holiday; full of friendly locals, or big-city-aloof. And so on.
Where this conversation so often goes wrong is in the idea that only pubs that match the observers’ particular preferences (which might take a decade of therapy to understand) are Proper Pubs — TRUE pubs. But pubs have been all sorts of things mixed up and inter-mingled since they faded into existence over the course of a few centuries — wine, beer, gin, food, music, art, theatre, children, bareboards, plush furnishings, cut glass, spit and sawdust — you name it. They’re all part of what is and has been The Pub.
http://i1.wp.com/boakandbailey.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/star_inn_window.jpg?resize=500%2C670
And when we talk to people for whom a post-war prefab was the Local, their memories are as fond as yours might be of a favourite Victorian corner pub or distant craft beer bar.
Ultimately, for us, the only defining feature of a pub is that we can walk in off the street without making an appointment and drink a beer or two without eating. (And, we suppose, without being made to feel guilty for not eating either.)*Beyond that, what defines the meaning of Pub is its diversity, and what makes for a classic pub is*that it gets to you, that you remember it and (optional?) that you find yourself longing to go back.
Defining a ‘Classic Pub’ (http://boakandbailey.com/2016/07/defining-classic-pub/) originally posted at Boak & Bailey's Beer Blog (http://boakandbailey.com)
More... (http://boakandbailey.com/2016/07/defining-classic-pub/)