[Norman Collins, author of ‘London Belongs to Me’.] Typed Letter Signed to Philip Dosse, publisher of ‘Books and Bookmen’, regarding a review he has written, and a party in his honour held by the English Centre of P.E.N.

See his entry in the Oxford DNB. The recipient Philip Dosse was proprietor of Hansom Books, publisher of a stable of seven arts magazines including Books and Bookmen and Plays and Players. See ‘Death of a Bookman’ by the novelist Sally Emerson (editor of ‘Books and Bookmen’ at the time of Dosse’s suicide), in Standpoint magazine, October 2018. The present item is 1p, 4to. Signed ‘Norman Collins’. In good condition, lightly aged. He is submitting a review of J. B. Priestley’s ‘Instead of the Trees’, in the hope that it is ‘the kind of thing that you had in mind’. He informs him that ‘the English Centre of P.E.N. is now launching a regular series of evening cocktail parties, each one with a special guest. They paid me the compliment of making me Guest of Honour at the first of these soirees, and Iris Murdoch and Angus Wilson are to be the next Guests.’ The party took place the previous week, and he lists some of those who were present: ‘Lettice Cooper, Francis King, Mary Treadgold, Sybille Bedford, Nicolette Devas, Catherine Dupre, Isabel Quigley, Dr. John Paxton, Robert Shelton, Kathleen Nott, and Jaspar Ridley.’