Raymond Kilgarriff (1928 – 2025)

Death of a bookseller

Raymond Kilgarriff, exceptional bookseller and much else, died peacefully at his home in St Leonards last month, aged 96. Bernard McGinley remembers an old-fashioned and charming professional.

Raymond Kilgarriff grew up in pre-War Brighton. His father had been in the Coldstream Guards. Though from an unbookish home, after the War he started at Holleyman & Treacher in Duke Street, Brighton, a bookshop noted for its cavernous premises and stock serendipity.

Later he spent five years with the august London firm of Bernard Quaritch, a firm noted for its exacting standards and mild eccentricity. Another move was to Heffers of Cambridge, another large, bookselling organisation demanding of diverse skills. The expertise he developed was seeable in an interview comment he made in 1991:

“I think the printing and design of booksellers’ catalogues is very important. We are, after all, supposed to have a bit of an eye for a book, and we should be able to transfer this taste to the appearance of our own catalogues”.

After Cambridge he moved to Hastings, to Howes Bookshop (still fondly remembered), at Braybrooke Terrace near the Station. Customers could be anyone from Japanese academics to local fishermen. The old schoolhouse was adapted with a mile of shelving, and the stock was impressive.

In the fullness of time, his competence and reliability led to him becoming the President of the Antiquarian Booksellers Association (ABA) from 1978 to 1980, where he emphasised the importance of standards. In that role he continued to promote his longstanding notion of a scholarship to foster the role of young people (who were its future) in the antiquarian book trade. “The shortage of books is less acute than the shortage of trained, experienced staff” he said. Eventually the ABA Educational Trust set up a Traineeship Scheme.

Raymond and Renate Kilgarriff

Other interests

Naturally life wasn’t all dusty tomes. He did National Service in Singapore though he found it tedious. Back in Britain he met and married his wife, who also worked at Quaritch’s. They had four children and many grandchildren, and also great-grandchildren.

He enjoyed gardening, and long-distance running, including Alpine marathons. He liked playing cricket and keeping fit. He liked jazz and classical music, including Bach. He was very much a family man. He was a member of the Burtons’ St Leonards Society and the 20 Club. He liked shoulder of lamb.

For decades a strong tradition was a walk from Ashburnham Place gate lodge to the Ash Tree Inn at Brown Bread Street, for lunch and a pint of Harvey’s. The ‘Doom & Gloom’ in Mercatoria was also a favourite.

Bibliophile but . . .

Even in retirement Raymond Kilgarriff did a little private bookdealing, but was never a collector. (“Slightly unprofessional” he thought.) He also worked for the International League of Antiquarian Booksellers (ILAB), and went on to be Secretary of the ILAB International Bibliographical Prize. A consummate bookman.

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