Charms Against Jackals: Ten Years of Two Rivers Press

extract from the Foreword Two Rivers Press is a Reading production, the brainchild of Peter Hay, one of the town’s most creative champions. Born in 1951, Pete grew up in Stockport and came to Reading in 1971 to study fine art at the university. The Press grew out of Pete’s delight in this underloved town and its sacred spaces. In Adam Sowan’s words: Pete believed in Reading, and his enthusiastic publication of local books and maps can be seen as part of a quiet campaign that a number of us have been waging for years – to prove that the town exists, lives, happens, and is by no means to be confused with Anywhere.’ Gradually, and with great success, two Rivers meandered away from its territorial roots and into more purely artistic arenas. National poetry competitions and zealous marketing brought published poets, writers, artists knocking on Pete’s door from all over the land, and with them came literary acclaim and TLS reviews. Artists who had barely heard of Reading thus keyed in obliquely to the strange, defiant passions that the town arouses, and took Pete’s vision to a discerning audience nationwide. Yet much of the best-selling work is still Reading-based; it is appropriate indeed that one of Pete’s last publications was Adam Sowan’s The Holy Brook, and Idiosyncratic and delightful survey of the town’s third and least-known waterway.