Cape Town: Tavern of the Seas
Author: Lawrence G. Green
205pp; 208 X 148mm;
Illustrated with 16 pp b/w pics.
Trade paperback.
ISBN 1-919854-12-6; bar code 978191854120
Non fiction


The classic Cape Town: Tavern of the Seas by Lawrence Green was first  published  in 1948 and more than 50 000 are in print. This does not include the number sold to those Education Departments who adopted the book. Green was a charming man and a prolific writer. With the death of the much loved Green in the early 1980s and the collapse of the publishing house, Howard Timmins, shortly before this, the book went out of print and has remained so for more than 20 two decades.

This evergreen book deals with charming folksy subjects like the wine of the Cape; Table Mountain; the Atlantic coast; Cape Town carnivals; the streets, canals and shops; the story of Simon’s Town, Seal Island; Table Bay; shipwrecks; reputed sea monsters; blatjang and sambals; the Cape Flats and so on.

If you love South Africa, you will love this book.

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Media reviews:

The book is the best known of Green’s works and is a celebration of Cape Town , characterised by the nostalgia of memory fading into oblivion. Green remembers the last of the old square-rigged whalers that came to Cape Town when he was a boy. ‘Tickey beer’, was already only a wistful memory but the tickey still survived. Now the tickey itself is gone and almost forgotten. Green traces the makers of fish horns, already a dying breed. Now the fish horn has fallen silent and only a dwindling minority still remember ‘Snoektown calling’. It’s good to have Green back in print. Pretoria News

Cape Town and its people live in Green’s writings. This book is about the Cape and especially about he romanticism during the 1947 period, the year the book was first published. Green's name is well known amongst Capetonians. Tavern of the Seas is full of anecdotal stories and descriptions with a vast historical background. It captures the colonial spirit and the enthusiasm of the people during period when the British Royalty visited SA in 1948 and this was a major news story. The south-westers, whales, wine, food, plants and animals, places like Table Mountain , Constantia, Falsebay and the Cape Flats , and obviously the people of the Cape live in this book. Volksblad — Bloemfontein .

There was a time when a row of Lawrence Green’s books seemed obligatory in almost every B&B and holiday home. Chatty, easy reads  that could be dipped into for a quick half an hour, they provided a familiar retrospect of this country’s history. Cape Town : Tavern of the Seas, first published in 1948 and ending up with some 50 000 copies in print was perhaps the best known, and it is a pleasure to find this reprinted. May many more follow. The Star — Johannesburg

This isn’t just a piece of Africana, it’s a book that helped to keep South Africa on the world stage and as such is part of our intellectual history and heritage. Another one we should be grateful to Galago for keeping alive. Farmers Weekly

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