The Saturday Book

The Saturday Book was an annual miscellany, published 1941-1975, reaching 34 volumes. It was edited initially by Leonard Russell and from 1952 by John Hadfield. A final compilation entitled "The Best of the Saturday Book" was published in 1981. The publisher throughout was Hutchinson.

"The Saturday Book" provides a valuable literary and artistic commentary about life in Britain during the Second World War and ensuing decades. It covered a range of arts, including ballet and music. Many writers contributed verse as well as essays.

Contributors

The many distinguished writers include Edward Ardizzone, H. E. Bates, Nicolas Bentley, John Betjeman, Graham Greene, Laurie Lee, L. S. Lowry, Philip Larkin, John Masefield, H. J. Massingham, George Orwell, J. B. Priestley, L. T. C. Rolt, Siegfried Sassoon, Evelyn Waugh and P. G. Wodehouse.

The series was profusely illustrated with photographs, woodcuts and line drawings, many specially commissioned.

Artists included Edward Ardizzone, Roland Emmett, L. S. Lowry, Lawrence Scarfe

Photographers included Bill Brandt, Cecil Beaton, Douglas Glass, Edwin Smith

Wood engravers included Robert Gibbings, George Maclay, Agnes Miller Parker.

Edwin Smith and Olive Cook wrote illustrated sections concerning collecting and ephemera.

George Orwell's essay 'Benefit of Clergy' in the volume for 1944 was suppressed on grounds of obscenity, though its title remains in the table of contents. [http://whitewolf.newcastle.edu.au/words/authors/O/OrwellGeorge/essay/CriticalEssays/salvadordali.html]