- When Elvis Presley walked off an army troop ship in Bremerhaven, West Germany on October 1, 1958, he was only 23 years old. It was his first (and only!) trip beyond the USA and Canada, courtesy of his local draft board in Memphis, Tennessee. His 17-month stay in Germany would be a pivotal period in his life and career.
In a town like London there are always plenty of not quite certifiable lunatics walking the streets, and they tend to gravitate towards bookshops, because a bookshop is one of the few places where you can hang about for a long time without spending any money.
George Orwell, “Bookshop Memories” in Fortnightly (November 1936)