A Boy at the Hogarth Press

by Richard Kennedy, Bevis Hillier (Introductor)

Richard Kennedy was educated at Marlborough. At sixteen, having failed to achieve an adequate academic standard, he left and went to work at the Hogarth Press.

After he left the Hogarth Press he took a journalists' course at University College, London, and subsequently he went to the Regent Street Polytechnic where he worked industriously as an art student for two years. In the years preceding the war he worked in an advertising agency. He married Olive Johnstone whom he had met at University College and has three children.

During the war Richard Kennedy served in the RAF ground staff and rose to the rank of Corporal. Since then he has occupied himself in illustrating children's books, which are known to children throughout the world. He has also written A Parcel of Time, a record of his life before he joined the Hogarth Press.

Genres: Nonfiction, Memoir, Books About Books, Biography Memoir, Biography, Autobiography, History

104 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

Richard Pitt Kennedy (1910-1989) was an English artist. He illustrated books for Eilís Dillon, J.M. Barrie, and Astrid Lindgren, among others. He also wrote books such as Little Love Song and the memoir, A Boy at the Hogarth Press, which chronicled his experiences as a teenager helping Leonard and Virginia Woolf with their printing press.

Reviews

[Lizzy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short but sweet book of recollections by Richard Kennedy, the teenage boy employed by Leonard and Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press in the late 1920s, a post he would remain in for the next five years, until they eventually parted ways after Leonard decided that the occasionally scatter-brained Kennedy had made one mistake too many. His memories are a joy to read, the hand-drawn illustrations even more so. Recommended.

[J.J. Garza · Rating 3 out of 5]

Un libro cortito. La memoria de un adolescente que, tras reprobar en la escuela, consigue trabajo en la editorial Hogarth (Hogarth Press) que es la editorial de los Woolf.

Dado que se trata de entradas de un diario personal, el estilo va de un lado a otro, sin muchas reflexiones y sin otra cosa que no sea contar las diferentes actividades que vivía el grupo de Bloomsbury. También, las maquinaciones internas de una editorial que trabajaba en un avejentado edificio en Londres y un esbozo de las manías de la pareja de los Woolf. Creo que me gustó más la memoria similar de Johanna Rakoff, que era la que trabajó en la editorial de Salinger.

[Joanna · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this up years ago at a used bookstore because I liked the cover. It turns out that it's a lovely little diary of a young clerk working at the publishing house run by Leonard and Virginia Woolf. The drawings added to the narrative and made for a lovely reading experience. Very entertaining book for a rainy weekend.

[thehalcyondaysofsummer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Opening line: ‘What you need to do is to get behind the counter, Richard.’

[Mind the Book · Rating 5 out of 5]

En pärla från The Open Book i Richmond (tidigare delvis startad och ägd av Pete Townshend, då The Magic Bus). I lördags var det Small Business Saturday i UK och #boblmaf klev in.

Som 16-åring hade Richard Kennedy trubbel med skolan. Via kontakter fick han jobb på Hogarth Press 1928 och flera decennier senare skrev densamme denna dagboksliknande redogörelse från tiden vid Tavistock Square.

Små glimtar från livet hos "Mr och Mrs W" på det lilla, fast expanderande förlaget, "Orlando is selling like hot cakes." Det speciella är illustrationerna. För min del kunde boken bara bestått av dem. Min favorit är den där Richard måste skruva upp en hylla och under skrivbordet ser man flera pappkartonger märkta 'To the Lighthouse'.

[Ivan · Rating 4 out of 5]

How do I describe this little book? It's like a diary - but doesn't consist of daily entries. The author worked at the Hogarth Press for two years. The book is exactly 100 pages. The entries run from a paragraph to two pages. It's a rather frivolous little book with amusing anecdotes and humorous asides, and not a full bodied memoir of life at the Hogarth. Still, I didn't want it to end. It transported me to another place and time - and I wanted to stay there.

[Peggy · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a delightful find! I didn’t know this book existed but am a Bloomsbury/ Virginia/ Vanessa groupie. I recently started a collage class at our local university, and this little brittle paperback was on top of a pile of discards heaped on a shelf for students to browse and cut up. The author’s drawings are as delightful as his simple but humorous brief tales describing his 5 years in his late teens working as an apprentice at Leonard and Virginia Woolf’s Hogarth Press 1928-1933.

[Ainsley Jeffery · Rating 3 out of 5]

Exceptional example of a diary of a nobody. Lovely hand drawn line style illustrations, no doubt accredited to Kennedy’s time as a student at University College. Maybe Gaudier-Brzeska inspired. Very brief & interesting critiques and insights in the Woolfs world and Bloomsbury.

[Susan Morris · Rating 4 out of 5]

A charming, short book, giving a look behind the scenes at Leonard & Virginia Woolf’s Hogarth Press.

[Jeffrey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Totally charming memoir of Bloomsbury!

[Celia T · Rating 2 out of 5]

I get that this is kind of trying to be Diary of a Nobody in Virginia Woolf's house, but it's just not as funny or clever as it thinks it is. If it had been an authentic diary written during the actual time Kennedy was working at the Hogarth press, I think I would have enjoyed it more just for its genuine historical value; as it is everything feels a little fake.

I did enjoy the illustrations, but tbh I'm knocking off a whole star just for this passage:

[Leonard Woolf] is the magician who keeps us all going by his strength of will - like the one in the Tales of Hoffmann - and Mrs W is a beautiful magical doll, very precious, but sometimes rather uncontrollable. Perhaps, like the doll, she hasn't got a soul. But when she feels inclined, she can create fantasy and we all fall over ourselves, or are disapproving.

This seems to me to be not only a wildly inaccurate understanding of the nature of the Woolves' relationship (and, frankly, of Tales of Hoffmann) but also needlessly insulting. Richard, dude, you're a sixteen year old office boy. Who are you to "disapprove" of Virginia freaking Woolf?

[Donald Busby · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really delightful account of Richard Kennedy’s brief time working under Leonard Woolf at his publishing house Hogarth Press. Brief honest and naive accounts of meeting the Woolf’s friends and other authors connected with the press. And a young man’s growing experience of life from working in a tiny office, running errands, making disastrous mistakes and having a generally good time. Lovely illustration by the author perfectly complement the stories and encounters. Only 100 pages long but a real gem.

[DocNora · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very short honest 'warts & all' sort of Bloomsbury memoir.
His lack of academic achievement at school, things like mistaking eschatology for scatology, makes me think that poor Mr.Kennedy probably was dyslexic! Charmingly illustrated and atmospheric despite the brevity and simplicity of the 'entries'.
Read it staying awake for a night shift in 1 sitting by a roaring fire..oh I didn't it want it to end.. Oh for a time machine!

[Bob Pomfret · Rating 4 out of 5]

A little book picked up on a whim that turns out to be a gem. Illustrated by his own easy scratchy ink drawings Kennedy tells of his first job working with Leonard and Virginia Woolf in the early days of the Hogarth Press. He easily describes that mixture of awkwardness/over confidence of youth that eventuslly leads to his dismissal... reminds me of how I lost my first job working on a local newspaper.

A nice quick post Christmas read.

[Jess · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very easy and charming read with lovely illustrations by the author throughout. Read in an afternoon - I wish it had been longer!

[Nora · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5: An enjoyable little memoir about working for the Woolf’s at Hogarth Press with illustrations by the author.

[Cooper Renner · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great casual drawings, brief vignettes of life among the Bloomsbury avant-garde. It could be longer and not outstay its welcome.

[Eleni · Rating 3 out of 5]

A short read, nothing remarkable. I expected more...

[Nicole Bladek · Rating 2 out of 5]

Didn’t seem to have a point really. Although I enjoyed the images and names that popped up. Easy read just not my type of book I guess.

[Adam · Rating 4 out of 5]

it’s just very pleasant to read

[Karen · Rating 5 out of 5]

Lovely line drawings.

[MKO · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderful little book! The illustrations were living, breathing things.

[Liam Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars. Needs more footnotes

[Tina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delightful, really quite funny.

[Susan · Rating 4 out of 5]

A delightful recounting in prose and line drawings of the author/illustrator's 4 years working as an office boy at Leonard and Virginia Woolf's Hogarth press.

"She [Virginia Woolf] started talking about the Hogarth Press in a way that I think didn't please LW [Leonard Woolf] very much, saying it was like keeping a grocer's shop. I think she is rather cruel in spite of the kind rather dreamy way she looks at you. She described Mrs Cartright as having the step of an elephant and the ferocity of a tiger, which gives a very false impression as Ma Cartright has no ferocity at all, although she does charge about everywhere. She also described her sliding down the area steps on her bottom, during the frost. I consider it bad form to laugh at your employees."

"LW and Uncle George are very opposite characters. When you ask LW a question he looks down at his toes. When you ask Uncle George something he looks up at the ceiling."

"I took the opportunity, as we were going down the area steps, of asking him [LW] if he believed in the immortality of the soul. "Obviously not!" he retorted. I could not help observing that Pinker [LW's dog] looked as if he had a soul. As far as LW was concerned, it would be to members of the animal kingdom alone that he would allow souls."

[Eva · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bilder av vardagen på Virginia och Leonard Woolfs förlag, nedtecknade av deras lärling under 3,5 år från 1928, då han var bara 16 år. Hans oskuldsfulla klarsyn är roande, att komma nära Bloomsbury-gruppens ikoner i vardagen. Leonard hade tydligen en kolerisk ådra som visade sig när det blev stressigt på jobbet. Och Virginia hade sina I Richards ögon uppseendeväckande egenheter.

Richard Kennedy var begåvad tecknare och ville gärna bli konstnär, fick av sin farbror höra "att det var varje ansvarskännande persons uppenbara plikt att avråda unga män och kvinnor från att ägna sig åt konst. Om de var begåvade nog skulle de göra det i alla fall." Så han skaffade honom lärlingsjobbet på det lilla förlaget, vars verksamhet ökat rejält sedan starten 1917. Han verkar ha varit allt-i-allo, inkl. att hantera tryckpressen ihop med Virginia. Några bokomslag fick han göra, men det var först efter några andra jobb som industriformgivare och annonstecknare, som hans konstnärliga ådra kom till sin rätt - som illustratör av flera hundra barnböcker.

Även den här memoarboken om Hogarth Press - i form av dagboksutdrag från hans arbete i tonåren - är illustrerad, tydliga drag av bland andra paret Woolf, och ritning över de enkla arbetslokalerna.

[Alessandro Margheriti · Rating 2 out of 5]

Probabilmente la cosa più interessante di questo libro sono le illustrazioni, che più delle parole riescono a rendere vivide le sensazioni e l'ambiente di Bloomsbury. Per il resto, purtroppo, Virginia in questo libro è qualcosa che resta sullo sfondo, come una piccola divinità da ammirare solo da lontano.

[Elise · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was given to me as a gift, by someone who knows I love Virginia Woolf, so I appreciate that, but I didn't do much for me. It had some funny anecdotes involving LW and VW, but otherwise ho-hum, and the author's sketches gave me a headache.

[Elise]

A totally charming short (96 pp) sketch in words and pictures of the author's few years as a young man at Virginia and Leonard Woolf's Hogarth Press. Per the flap copy,it "offers a unique peep into the Bloomsbury set."

[Jamie · Rating 4 out of 5]

A hidden gem that I read about. A young boy gets a job at the Hogarth Press and describes Leonard and Virginia Woolf and some of their friends. Oh how the daily life of a person says so much about them. The pen and ink drawings are delightful.