It's time for another email from Benjamin Partridge PLC - now a proud subsidiary of Unilever.
Re: Unilever. The whole affair was a whirlwind, culminating in some slightly confusing negotiations which took place on a golf course in Jersey. Long story short, I thought I was shaking hands on a free sachet of Persil ColourFast with Sicilian Lemon scent, but according to their lawyer (and not mine, who has disappeared) it represented a binding agreement to let Unilever acquire Benjamin Partridge PLC.
It was only driving home from the course that I realised that what I had thought of as a slightly boggy game of golf was in fact a hostile corporate takeover. Of course I fought it through the courts. However due to several emails going into my spam folder, and my lawyer still being missing (his wife said he’s gone rollerblading - but for 6 months? Unconvincing if not impossible), I left with a bill for £250,000 and another sachet of Persil ColourFast with Sicilian Lemon scent. Which to be fair to them is great stuff.
Anyway.
Yesterday a programme I made with the poet and comedian Rob Auton went out on BBC Radio 4 and is now on BBC Sounds and can be found here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001s53w
It's about the experimental novel "The Unfortunates" by BS Johnson.
I've been a huge admirer of Rob's for such a long time so it was a real treat to get to work with him.
As with all of these sorts of programmes, as the producer you end up having to edit out a lot of good stuff. The principle example in this case is a bit we recorded outside Nottingham Forest's football ground where Rob compares the 1960s experimental author B.S. Johnson to Roy Keane.
Also a nice bit where Rob considers whether Nottingham Forest winger Anthony Elanga has ever used a paperclip. I think that’s a really good question.
With those sections littering the cutting room floor, just imagine what stayed in
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In other news, I received an email from a stranger out of the blue this morning with a copy of a film made for BBC One in 1971 by my great uncle, the ethnographer Dr Arthur F Partridge. I’d never seen it before! I've put a clip of it up on Youtube here:
Bye now! Bye!