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Published 23 March 2006

Tales of a Cultural Conduit

and The Nervous Set

Tales of a Cultural Conduit is the third volume of Jay Landesman's memoirs, published by eclectic London publisher Tiger of the Stripe and includes an edited version of the first two volumes of Jay Landesman's reminiscences Rebel Without Applause (Bloomsbury) and Jaywalking (Weidenfeld and Nicolson).

The book also includes for the first time The Nervous Set, Landesman's unpublished novel of his exploration of life in New York in the 1950s. Gershon Legman who urged him to publish it 40 years ago, said: 'It's a perfect portrait of the period which I do not believe has ever been portrayed at all, let alone so well.'

Tales of a Cultural Conduit takes us from Landesman's life as an antique dealer in St. Louis, to New York and his magazine Neurotica: the Authentic Voice of the Beat Generation and on to the Crystal Palace Cabaret Theater in St. Louis where he invited artists to break in their cabaret acts, including Woody Allen, Barbra Streisand, and Lenny Bruce. 'The cocktail hour was orchestrated like an opera bouffe - music, booze and just the right mix of jarring people... Landesman produced Waiting for Godot instead of South Pacific and thus heralded the cultural renaissance,' wrote John Clellon Holmes.

Jay has continued the cultural renaissance since he put down roots in England in the swinging sixties, starting with his first publishing venture, a reprint of By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept by Elizabeth Smart, the first punk novel by teenage Gideon Sams, with a safety pin in the cover, and Heathcote Williams Hancock's Last Half Hour. He lives with his wife Fran, the award-winning lyricist and their son Miles Davis Landesman, the musician in the most bohemian household in Islington.

260pp.   Paperback   £ 8.99   ISBN 1 904799 08 6