In late September 1920, former MP and firebrand socialist Victor Grayson vanished into thin air, leaving behind one of Britain’s most haunting political mysteries. According to Hilda Porter, the manageress of his London apartment building, Grayson had been receiving biweekly cash deliveries from two uniformed men. On his final day, two enigmatic strangers arrived, spent…
The Holocaust Was Complete: The Great Gatsby and the Lost Green Light of Liberty Part II
The second of a two-part look at the impact that the sinking of the Titanic may have had on the conception of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby. What does the author mean by ‘the Holocuast was complete’? What was the author saying about the times? Henry Adams and F. Scott Fitzgerald weren’t the only…
The Green Light at the End of the Dock. The Great Gatsby and Titanic
April 10, 2023 marks 98 years since the publication of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby, and 111 years since the RMS Titanic left Southampton’s White Star Dock on its ill-fated maiden voyage. This article explores the meaning and symbolism behind the green light and how it may have been partly inspired by the Titanic…
Alexis Sheftel and the Society of Friends of Russian Freedom
In March 1901, a petition was published by a group of Russian exiles as part of a protest at the compulsory drafting of 183 students at Kiev University into the Tsar’s imperial army. According to a report that accompanied the petition, the same fate had befallen a further twenty-five students of St Petersburg University. According…
Victor Grayson MP – A Timeline Biography
Timeline September 5, 1881: Albert Victor Grayson is born in Liverpool. Just a few months previously, the Grayson family had been living on Sidney Street in the Poplar district of London — scene of an infamous siege. In the late 1800s and early 1900s the Poplar district was home to the largest Russian émigré community…
Herbert Elvin, Father Baker, Josef Stalin and the 5th Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party
One of the most frequently overlooked allies of Kinder Scout ‘right to roam’ campaigners, G.H.B Ward, William Rust and Benny Rothman was Herbert H. Elvin. Like Ward, Elvin had emerged in Britain’s blooming Trade Union movement, quickly recognising the positive trade-off between working men’s groups and sport. The Clarion Ramblers and Clarion Cyclists were among…
Meyer Wolfsheim — Arnold Rothstein, Scott Fitzgerald and The Great Gatsby
In the last article we were introduced to Max Gerlach, the ‘gentleman bootlegger’ who had provided the partial inspiration for Jay Gatsby. Then there’d been that bombshell discovery that Max had been running a speakeasy for Arnold Rothstein, the notorious mobster who had ‘fixed’ the 1919 World Series. The speakeasy, adjacent to the Coronet Apartments…
Max von Gerlach aka Max Stork – The Original Great Gatsby?
“He started as one man I knew and then changed into myself.” That’s how the author described his most famous creation, Jay Gatsby. And on the evidence currently available there’s no reason to doubt him. Discoveries made by Matthew J. Bruccoli and Horst Kruse suggest that the ‘one man’ he knew was Max Gerlach, whose…
The Eyes of Dr T. J. Eckleburg, The Valley of Ashes and the Meaning and Inspiration Behind Them.
Blending into the background and creating a mask is all part of the tradecraft of being a spy, and whether it’s the endless whirring rumours at Gatsby’s parties, the private investigations into his business affairs carried out by his love rival Tom Buchanan, or the eyes of Dr T. J. Eckleburg staring out with haunting…
The Cult of Tradition: Let’s Make The Past Great Again! ™
Before you went to the bar, Mr Farage, we were talking about why people like you and me were jumping into our little spaceships and hurtling back through time. I was talking about time just being another modern consumable and argued that providing there were enough independent time traders like your good self around, going…