London has always been home to outsiders. To people who won't, or can't, abide by the conventions of respectable society. For close to two centuries these misfit individualists have had a name. They have been called Bohemians.

This book is an entertaining, anecdotal history of Bohemian London. A guide to its more colourful inhabitants: Rossetti and Swinburne, defying the morality of high Victorian England; Oscar Wilde and Aubrey Beardsley in the decadent 1890s; The Bloomsburyites and the Bright Young Things; Dylan Thomas, boozing in the Blitz; and Francis Bacon and his cronies, wasting time and getting wasted in 1950s Soho.

It's also a guide to the places where Bohemia has flourished: the legendary Café Royal, a home from home to artists and writers for nearly a century, the Cave of the Golden Calf, the Colony Room, the Gargoyle Club and more.

The story of Bohemian London is one of drink and drugs, sex and death, excess and indulgence. It's also a story of achievement and success. This book provides a lively and enjoyable portrait of the world in which Bohemian Londoners once lived, and perhaps still do.

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By Nick Rennison