by K.J. Pratt
Books v. cigarettes: 63 years on
To the best of the Editor’s knowlege, Keir John Pratt was not born in British India in 1903; nor did he serve with the Indian Imperial Police from 1922 until 1927. He does smoke*, read and write a lot though.
*correct at time of writing, but inaccurate at time of press
about two years ago I moved in around the corner from one of George Orwell’s
old homes in Islington. I know this because a blue plaque proudly declares the fact. Orwell is responsible for quite an important moment in my literary life; his masterpiece, 1984, was the first proper novel that I read without a teacher or a curriculum forcing me to. I didn’t know it at the time, but just a few years later, I would be addicted to the two same basic substances as this Great Writer... In 1946 Orwell wrote Books v. cigarettes. In the essay, he investigates his literary spending habits, concluding that he spends “in the neighbourhood of £25 a year” on books. He goes on to compare this amount to his other pastime, smoking, on which he spends £40 a year. In the end he implores people to “admit that it is because reading is a less exciting pastime than going to the dogs, the pictures or the pub, and not because books, whether bought or borrowed, are too expensive”. Orwell died in 1950 at the age of 46, from a burst artery in his lung; his six ounces of tobacco a week no doubt contributed to his untimely demise. Orwell was never really aware of the legacy he left us in 1984; what was perhaps his finest work was published only six months before his death. So have things have moved on in the intervening 60 years? We like to think that we are a brighter lot than the post-war poverty-stricken soot-covered masses; better fed, in better health and certainly more literate. But some things haven’t changed. I am addicted to the two same substances as Orwell was: the one that made him and the one that destroyed him – books and cigarettes. With the various economic pressures affecting leisure activities, and the arrival of new ones, what I want to know is: how does the book how does the book fare? Is reading still the cheaper pastime? I don’t smoke quite the same amount as Orwell, in fact I smoke around ten a day, or three-and-a-half packs a week. My brand is £5.11 per pack and so over a year I spend £930. Now for the tricky part: the books. Orwell breaks down the method of appropriation: bought, borrowed, gifted, or stolen etc. First of all, and similarly to Orwell, I have two sets of books in two different locations. However, each contains a similar number of volumes and can be sorted into comparable categories. So, based on the set that is readily available for me to count, here goes. The numbers in fig. 1 account for five years, so I can calculate the total expenditure based on Hardbacks bought 12 averaged prices, as fig. 2. Paperbacks bought 128 This comes to a total Hardbacks bought secondhand 4 expenditure of £235 per year, Paperbacks bought secondhand 42 just shy of ten times that in Gifted hardback 6 Gifted paperback 38 Stolen paperback 4 Cheap classics 24 Total 258
fig. 1