The Heywood Hill Bookshop in Mayfair London has organized a webinar in connection with the upcoming publication of the unexpurgated diaries of politician and gossip “Chips” Channon. Here are the details from The Oldie magazine:
Henry ‘Chips’ Channon: The Diaries 1918-38, edited by Simon Heffer
Heywood Hill’s bookshop have organised a zoom webinar at 6.30pm on 4 March 2021 to mark the long awaited unexpurgated publication of Chips Channon’s diaries. Professor Simon Heffer, the book’s editor, will be in conversation with Rt Hon Michael Gove MP. Register for the zoom here. Purchase your copy from Heywood Hill by 31 March 2021 and you will qualify for entry into a Prize Draw to win a post-pandemic literary treat: High Tea at Heywood Hill, an hour’s browsing in the legendary bookshop, with tea, cake or something stronger and £50 spending money.
Here is some additional information from the bookstore’s website:
The discussion will be followed by a Q&A hosted by Heywood Hill’s Nicky Dunne.
Born in Chicago in 1897, ‘Chips’ Channon settled in England after World War I, married into the immensely wealthy Guinness family, and served as Conservative MP for Southend-on-Sea from 1935 until his death in 1958. Channon’s career was unremarkable but his diaries are quite the opposite. Elegant, gossipy and catty by turns, they are the unfettered observations of a man who went everywhere and who knew everybody. They will surely be considered by future generations as the one of the most entertaining and important British historical documents of the 20th century.
The first 300 copies sold by Heywood Hill will be signed by Professor Heffer. Heywood Hill will begin sending out pre-ordered copies on March 3. All purchases of this book from Heywood Hill completed by March 31, 2021 will also qualify for entry into a Prize Draw to win a post-pandemic literary treat: High Tea at Heywood Hill.
A single volume edition of the diaries was published in 1967 and edited by Robert Rhodes James. A paperback edition of that version was issued by Weidenfield and Nicolson in 1993. Waugh was mentioned twice in that volume; neither of those was particularly flattering: “…He looks like a ventriloquist’s doll, with his shiny nose…” (16 December 1934). The new edition will appear in three volumes, the first of which is to be published next month. The editor of this volume, Simon Heffer, is a professorial research fellow at University of Buckingham and columnist for the Sunday Telegraph.
UPDATE: 7 March 2021 Last paragraph amended to reflect publication of new edition in three volumes.