Dear Readers,
Good afternoon, and welcome back to Off The Fence, a newsletter hand-roasted for a smooth, rich finish.
Summer is clearly over, because this week we had the final sighting of the issue entered in for our contest, presumably waiting for the plane home at gate 12 of Indira Gandhi International Airport. It’s a strong entry, but we have a winner: this outstanding snap of The Fence as a tarot table in East Berlin. With the location, the creativity, the spiritual divination and, of course, the boots, we soon found ourselves running out of fingers to count the points scored. Bravo.
Thank you to everyone who sent pictures in. It was a real bumper crop this time round, and the good news is, it will soon start all over again, with Issue 25 just around the corner. Until then we’ll give your eyes a rest from robust black and orange. Have a look at some green, if you like.
Lastly, our three- and five-mag bundles are now available for purchase for any businesses who might be looking to keep a few copies around the office; perhaps one of those fine publications who seem to take such a keen interest in our work? For those interested in the single copy subscriptions, a notice that we will be having to put our postage prices up slightly in the near-future. It’s not you, it’s not us, it's them. For anyone thinking of getting a subscription, however, this change is yet to come in, so get it while the getting is good.
Finely ground and pressed into a puck this week, we have Sir Roy Strong’s workout routine, timely board games from Fences past and some master diplomacy from the Japanese Ambassador to Mexico. But first, a list of the best straight men in publishing.
Killingbeck, Softly, With His Song
The gender balances in the capital’s various sectors and industries are genuinely intriguing. Have you ever come across a man who works in the shadowy mafia that is food PR? Do you know any women tapping on the terminals of the oil trade? We’re pretty sure they exist, we just haven’t met any.
In our own world, the beleaguered arena of print media, you’ll find men and women in equal numbers (give or take), but in the world of book publishing – still rich, still powerful – there is a comparative dearth of men, and of that proportion, fewer still are straight.
Women in publishing are not particularly sympathetic. ‘Their vibe is kind of, “A-Level English teacher at an all-girls school”,’ says one. ‘There’s a lot of quiet men in horn-rimmed glasses and button-down Oxford shirts, secretly loving the female attention.’
‘Have you heard of the concept of the “Publishing 10”?’ another bookworld maven relays. ‘Whenever you meet someone in publishing who is halfway charming or handsome, he’s a Publishing 10’.
‘There’s a lot of performative wife-guy behaviour,’ added another. ‘They all, for some reason, love cricket. It’s their secret society – not that they’re up to anything interesting.’
This all sounded a bit on the nose to us. What’s wrong with uxorious men declaring their love for literature? Is wearing a nice shirt a hate crime? So we assembled a panel of anonymous women in the book world to ask one question: Who’s the most gallant galley-dispenser? The Fresh Prince of the Frankfurt Book Fair? Who is the best straight man in publishing?
Over the last week, our WhatsApps pinged and pealed with messages – though a few correspondents mistakenly thought we were asking for the ‘fittest guy in the publishing industry’. (Ladies, it’s 2025!)
We were looking for charm, wit, generosity and vigour – and consensus soon emerged as we whittled down our list.
There were multiple nominations for Huw Armstrong, publishing director at HarperCollins UK; for Orion’s Emad Akhar; for William Collins’ editorial director, Jamie Birkett; and for Viking’s Daniel Crewe, who would, we are told, ‘buy me a Pret sandwich whenever I had to stay late in the office.’ But we do have a winner’s podium.
In third place is AM Heath agent, Tom Killingbeck: ‘genuinely charming’, ‘cool in an old-fashioned way’, and he does, we have to say, look very nice indeed, and has a very cool second career which we will not lift the lid on.
Another agent, RCW’s Tristan Kendrick, came in second, with one nomination stating, ‘I think he is probably the most universally beloved person in publishing.’
At the top – our runaway winner – was Jim Gill, agent at Felicity Bryan: a Scottish charmer who, we can’t help but add, loves his cricket.
A Gala Evening
Last Wednesday, our pints correspondent, Jimmy McIntosh, flew across the Atlantic to be interviewed at the New York Public Library by Dua Lipa. A wonderful time was had by all. If you’d like Jimmy to do an event, please reach out at editorial@the-fence.com.
There are a few copies of the book remaining with our friends at Backstory — and like us, they do ship internationally.
The Pellicle Brief
You may have noticed our passion for the pub in previous editions of this newsletter, in past issues or possibly in our new book. More than this, we’ve been energised by the rising standard of drinks writing in this country, and few places can boast a record of such quality as our friends at Pellicle.
For years, we’ve been fans of Pellicle’s narrative-driven approach to drinks writing – stories rooted in traditions, communities and above all, people. One flick through their back catalogue, and you’ll find answers to questions that have long bedevilled fans of the public house: How did Scampi Fries come to be? What’s the allure of Cidre Breton? Why does Tennent’s Lager have such a hold over Scotland?
They publish fantastic writers, from TF contributors Hannah Crosbie & Robbie Armstrong, to names like Gavin Cleaver, Anna Sulan Masing and Brixton’s number one Japanophile, Tim Anderson. They’re also in the podcast game, where editor-in-chief Matthew Curtis speaks to brewers, malters and vintners across the country about their passions and processes. Tune in on your commute home, and soon enough you’ll be stopping off at your local taproom for a pint of something interesting.
Pellicle has big plans for the year ahead, with a new editorial hire and a host of more brilliant pieces in the pipeline – news we love to hear. If that sounds like something for you, they’re supportable through Patreon, and we encourage you to sign up today.
They call this an ‘ad swap’ – and they’d be right to do so. If you’d like to swap an ad with us, email cb@the-fence.com and let’s get cross-promoting.
Better ‘Letters Than the Rest
Our other newsletter has been sallying forth, with a new edition last Thursday carrying theatrical warnings, the best brutalist building in London and the return of the feared Secret Chef, who had the capital’s worst chef Instagrams on his chopping board. Sorry, Jackson! For those unfamiliar with his work, we have a degree of envy at your chance to read his dispatches for the first time. He’s had Marina O’Loughlin, Jay Rayner and Giles Coren in his sights before.
We are perhaps exceedingly proud of our lovely Capital Letter, but it really is hard to find good writing about London these days. This is fortnightly and full of more than just recommendations; it's a guide on where London is right now, and how to read the pulse of its heady, toxic veins.
We’ve had dispatches from London’s most embarrassing gallery, a valuable list of the capital’s best boozers and revelations about the true identity of the mysterious Pleckbond Ltd on Falcon Road.
Nor the Years Condemn
There was a fantastic interview with TF favourite, Nicky Haslam, in the week’s FT, where the 85-year-old design maven said that the best way to spend £20 is ‘on a pack of cigarettes and a lighter’. But there is one aesthete even more ageless than Queen Nicky: behold, this staggering photo of Sir Roy Strong, on the occasion of his 90th birthday. Keep pumping iron, Roy – you are inspiring.
24 Issue Party People
Our wonderful Issue 24 continues its online journey and we can’t resist the opportunity to remind you how much of it is available for immediate digital perusal.
It kicks off with Sophie Wilkinson’s experience of the worryingly common modelling scam as a teenager and Jack Beaumont’s report on life for staff and students in a SEND school, before taking a short ferry to tour the street preachers of Belfast. A whirlwind of some of our highest quality dispatches yet.
We then sought to provide some essential answers to some of the most serious of existential questions: How do I find love?, how do I prepare for the end times? and how do I get a ticket for Tay Tay’s next concert? Finally, we changed down from 11th to ninth gear and sailed through the chicane with Mattha Busby’s account of the ludicrous world of bee shamanism.
Our features saw Will Buckley raise a glass to the late Gary Fairfull: Shoreditch inventor, serial product-pitcher (do you like the sound of ‘stoup’?) and close friend. John Phipps toured another now-passed London institution – the strange remnants of the vast Russian Trade Delegation, formerly a hub of spy activity which is now (almost) abandoned.
Bron Maher delivered an incredible piece detailing the complex world of the Tina Triangle, talking to those involved in an increasingly prevalent drug scene. Finally, Patrick Galbraith took us to the top of a hill in south Wales by chasing down the illusive trail of the UK’s free party scene in an excerpt from his tremendous book, Uncommon Ground.
And if that wasn’t enough, we left room for dessert: Eva Wiseman’s excellent short story, Sugar Mummy. Print readers may be feeling smug, as they have surely noticed there is one morsel we have left off your virtual plates. Keep your eyes peeled.
Life in the VIP Lane
Earlier this week, ITV’s excellent documentary COVID Contracts: Follow The Money aired to a boffo five-star review in the Guardian, and we’d like to extend our own healthy recommendation to you here. It’s a deeply probing account of one of the most extraordinary cash grabs in recent political history – one which we've always felt passed by without enough meaningful examination of the tens of billions (with a b) of public money, that was designated for PPE at a time of national crisis.
Given that the most charitable reading of this affair is that the government was, at a time of acute public need, guilty of the most egregious incompetence and neglect imaginable – and the more likely diagnosis is one of active, craven, gleeful profiteering – we feel it’s safe to call a scandal of great national importance, worth as large an audience as possible. Why, then, ITV chose to broadcast the documentary at 10.15 on a Monday night before shunting it on to ITVX two days later is anyone’s guess.
It is, of course, a subject close to our hearts. As those who remember PANDEMILLIONS may recall.
Growing increasingly unhinged by the scandal as it was raging, The Fence made a board game in which the object was to ‘waste’ as much money from the public purse as possible, using LOOT cards taken from real life examples of incompetence, cronyism and things that really seemed to look a lot like fraud to us – but we couldn’t possibly comment.
We recently discovered the last two copies of the game in a dusty old lockup, guarded by a mercurial hooded figure with a skeletal, beckoning hand. If you’d like to own one or both of them, before they get snapped up by Hasbro for a deal so lucrative it earns us a lifelong retirement, email us at editorial@the-fence.com.
In Case You Missed It
Alaa Abd el-Fattah has been released by Egypt following his long imprisonment and mother’s hunger strike.
Monocle takes a look at how national militaries’ Gen Z ad campaigns are shaping up.
Der Spiegel confirms that Grandmaster Magnus Carlsen is an odd man.
Huck takes us to the harshest realm, via a tour of Gen X teen bedrooms.
Drop everything and play the most fun, and most enraging, game you will ever play in your life: I Am Not A Robot.
And Finally
Among all the correctives that have come in the wake of cultural appropriation discourse, there are few lost liberties we mourn. The sight of festival revellers donning cornrows and Lakota war bonnets are not to be missed, and until those sour-faced scolds in the Hague make it a crime to adopt a zesty Italian accent while praising a particularly spicy meatball, we will maintain a dignified silence in this most tired of culture war discourses.
Sometimes, however, even we are not sure where the battle lines are drawn. Take the case of the Japanese Ambassador to Mexico, who last week celebrated his host nation’s independence with a video which sought to party like it was 1821.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZOD5eFx-4J4
Come for the fake moustache and sombrero, stay for the very, very, very long pan across the office (full video here) in which it becomes laboriously apparent that no expense was spared to make this the most bafflingly comprehensive ‘celebration’ of Mexican culture ever undertaken by a Japanese man. Judging from the lack of any fallout whatsoever, it would seem his stunt was taken in the spirit in which it was intended. If we ever work out what, precisely, said intention was, we’ll be first to let you know.
And now, the end is here, but what true friends we’ve made along the way. Please remember to buy a tote bag, map or a subscription here, and we’ll join you one week hence. Feel free to drop us a line or send us a snap of our mag or book in-situ, to editorial@the-fence.com. The logos for Chupa Chups lollipops and high street pawnshop CeX were designed by Salvador Dalí and Charlie Brooker respectively. Speak soon.
All the best,
TF