Gone with the Wind (1939) encapsulates the huge difficulty so often confronted at Persephone: should we despise a book or a film because it encapsulates attitudes that are abhorrent to us nowadays but were simply part of the language ('discourse' as academics would say) at the time the film or book appeared? We get an email a month about perceived antisemtisim in one or two of our books. Yet in a list of great films of the 1930s we cannot possibly ignore Gone with the Wind. Even though 'the enslaved Black people in the film conform to old racial stereotypes “as servants notable for their devotion to their white masters, or for their ineptitude. The film’s treatment of this world through a lens of nostalgia denies the horrors of slavery, as well as its legacies of racial inequality"'  (Professor Jacqueline Stewart quoted here). Gone with the Wind has now been reissued with a video preceding the main film about 'why it should be viewed in its original form, contextualised and discussed'. This seems very sensible. But here is an article saying that the film is undeniably racist (this is true) and should be banned (it should not).

The Philadelphia Story (1940) would be a fun film to watch over Christmas, (or should we say 'Christmas' as it's quite likely to be cancelled in the UK), it's not as glorious or subtle as The Apartment but still pretty darnn wonderful.

Gance's Napoléon (1927) is certainly one of the greatest films ever made. For those who have not heard of it, here is a BFI piece about it and here is a piece by Kevin Brownlow describing his long obsession with the film and how, thanks to his heroic efforts, it was eventually restored and shown again.

A couple of weeks ago we had the five best films of 1945-65 on the Post and said that we would suggest five for 1925-45 in the New Year. Well, here they are for Christmas viewing! Except unfortunately the first up is a great film but has been seen by only a tiny handful of Persephone readers (it was going to be shown in Bruton in Somerset in March, to a sold-out out crowd, but we all know what happened to that plan). The Homemaker (1924, so we are stretching the point), based on our bestselling reprint, is a silent film, rediscovered by Kevin Brownlow in an archive in California. It is one of the best films ever made – because it is so subtle and true about human nature. And all wordlessly! We plan to show it next year, but who knows. There is an excellent piece about the film here.

Ironically (since Rose Henriques was always trying to raise money for the East End) there was a very successful sale of her paintings last year. This is what the Sussex sale room said: 'The works were found in an attic owned by an acquaintance of Henriques and taken to the saleroom, every picture sold against estimates set in the low hundreds to total just over £30,000. The most dramatic of the picture group was the work titled There Goes Another, At Flying Bomb Incident. The 20in x 2ft oil on canvas depicts powerful searchlights and figures convening around a bomb site', more details of the sale here. And here is some information about Basil and Rose Henriques at the University of Southampton site.

Hessel Street market in the East End, painted by Rose Henriques in the 1930s. 'It was re-developed in the 50s and the market was swept away, but here it’s thronging with people: market traders, someone carrying a sack on his back, children, babies in prams, stiff-tailed dogs sniffing each other, policemen chatting and someone with a tray selling ribbons maybe, who looks as though he’s walked straight out of a 19^th century edition of Cries of London. This could just as easily be street life 1880 as 1930' (Town House Spitalfields here).

And here is something about the life of the amazing Rose: 'Born into a cultured, orthodox Jewish family, she assisted at Basil Henriques’s East End boys’ club and founded a girls’ club in 1915. During the First World War she worked as a VAD (Voluntary Aid Detachment), and she and Basil married in 1917. The clubs merged and in 1919 they founded the Oxford and St George’s Settlement Synagogue. In 1929, the club and synagogue relocated to Bernhard Baron House, Berners Street (now Henriques Street, named in 1963). Rose led the girls’ club, also providing activities for the elderly. During the Second World War she was an ambulance driver and air raid warden but also painted scenes she witnessed on a daily basis – mobile canteens and bombed out homes – and later volunteered in Germany, assisting and rehabilitating concentration camp survivors.' And through all this she painted!