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Everyman's England

Anthology of travel articles (304 pages, 59,144 words)

This was a collection of features that Canning had been commissioned to write for the Daily Mail. Ten of them were originally published in the paper usually on Saturdays between December 1935 and February 1936; the dates of these are noted below. There must have been one scheduled for publication on 18th or 25 January 1936, but this never appeared, since within three days the deaths had occurred of Rudyard Kipling and then King George V, and all available editorial space was devoted to tributes. The Hodder and Stoughton edition was published with an initial print run of 4,000 copies in October 1936, and there was a second printing in November 1936. The last 600 copies were remaindered in November 1940, so there may have been other reprints meanwhile. It is one of the easiest to find of Canning's pre-war titles.

The illustrator was Leslie Stead, who was well known as the main illustrator of the Biggles books, as well as having designed many book jackets for authors published by Collins and Hodder & Stoughton, including Agatha Christie and Hammond Innes.

An abridged version has been published on CD as an audiobook. The reader is Charles Collingwood, best known for his role as Brian Aldridge in The Archers, and the publisher is Crimson Cats. Chapters included in this version are marked with [CC] below.

The dedication is "To Polly and Jojo", a dog and a cat. The dog's full name was Polycarp.

  1. Northward Ho! (Berwick-on-Tweed) [CC]
  2. Cumberland contrast (Silloth to Maryport—21 December 1935) [CC]
  3. Town of surprises (Halifax)
  4. Broad acres (Bolton Abbey, Wharfedale, Kilnsey—1 February 1936)
  5. Between two rivers (The Wirral, Birkenhead)
  6. The Potteries (Stoke-on-Trent, The Potteries—15 February 1936) [CC]
  7. The smallest of the family (Rutland)
  8. Fenland town (March—7 December 1935) [CC]
  9. All the way, please! (London)
  10. Norfolk (Norfolk villages, Holt—14 December 1935) [CC]
  11. Caravan on the Cotswold (Broadway, Stow-on-the-Wold—28 December 1935)
  12. No ordinary town (Dursley) [CC]
  13. Bath (22 February 1936) [CC]
  14. The other Oxford (Oxford)
  15. Off the main road (Kent villages, Canterbury—6 January 1936) [CC]
  16. Exercise with a map (Dunkery, Exford, Combe Martin)
  17. Dorchester (8 February 1936) [CC]
  18. Bideford (11 January 1936)
  19. Somewhere in Cornwall (Village near Bideford) [CC]
First edition 1936
Click to enlarge		 Index of places
and themes
(in preparation)