Alternative London, First Edition, 1970
Alternative London Survival Guide for Strangers, First Edition, 1972
Written by Nicholas Saunders.
Published by the author and printed and bound at Index Printers, Dunstable, Bedfordshire.
Condition: Alternative in London is in good condition but with some wear to spine, as shown in images. Alternative London Survival Guide for Strangers is in great condition. Both have slight yellowing of interior pages due to age. Both are clean copies with no inscriptions or pen marks.
Nicholas Saunders was a British activist in the 'alternative' movement of the 1970s, and his books Alternative London and Alternative London Survival Guide for Strangers, were cult titles of this era.
Alternative London, which was published straight to paperback in 1970, in a print run of 50,000 copies. It is an encyclopaedic guide to living in London, particularly for young people squatting, living on low incomes, on the fringes of conventional society, and with alternative values and ambitions such as living communally and pursuing spiritual development.
Alternative London Survival Guide for Strangers followed in 1972, and was a new take on Alternative London aimed at young people coming to London for the first time, and who wanted to be part of alternative culture, rather than disengaged observers of typical tourist attractions.
Later, Nicholas Saunders wrote the E for Ecstasy series, inspired by his personal experience with MDMA. At the time of his death, he was researching the use by peoples in various parts of the world of psychoactive drugs as part of traditional social rituals.
This is a rare opportunity to buy both of Saunders' seminal Alternative London works in first edition, at the same time.
It's also an opportunity to find out what hostels, communes, sex, drugs, social security, legal aid, healing, homeopathy, flying saucers, contraception, pubs, public baths, fringe theatre and seedy West End nightlife was all about during the sizzling 1970s.