“Shortly before the war Ted Ardizzone and I worked together on a book about London pubs, which we called ‘The Local’. By the time it appeared the war had begun, and the book’s career ended when unsold copies, sheets, and plates of the drawings went up together in the burning of Cassells’ premises in Belle Sauvage Yard.” From the Foreword by Maurice Gorham to ‘Back to the Local’ (1949). ‘The Local’ bears comparison with ‘High Street’ in its colourful celebration of an aspect of English social life and is just as hard to find in really good condition. Copies with the fragile jacket are very scarce.