FORMER PROMINENT  BOOKSELLER  PETER EMANUEL CELEBRATES 70TH BIRTHDAY


On Tuesday evening this week Peter Emanuel, former director of London Bookshops, celebrated his 70th birthday with family and friends at a dinner in Auckland.

There were three speakers - Colin Manoy, (above with Peter), a friend of Peter since pre-school days who spoke on behalf of friends, Lisa Emanuel, Peter & Carole's youngest daughter, a Sydney lawyer, who spoke on behalf of family, and Bookman Beattie who spoke on behalf of book trade friends and former colleagues. Colin let us into a few fascinating facts about Peter's early life annd activities while Lisa spoke beautifully, and with great humour, about growing up in the Emanuel home and the role her father played in those years.


Here are my speech notes:

Not long after I joined the book trade back in 1968 as a co-founder of Beattie & Forbes Bookshop in Napier I was elected to the Council of the Booksellers Association. Peter & David Emanuel were also members, not long after David went on to be President, and I shall always remember their great kindness to me, a former banker now bookseller and still very much learning the ropes. I learned so much from them and in the course of that we became firm friends and have remained so ever since.

Over the years I would often go up to Peter & Carole’s home in Khandallah for dinner and it became my very pleasant duty on those occasions to read bedtime stories to their beautiful daughters, the sons were yet to arrive!

It is so lovely to see three of those daughters here tonight - Jodie and Lisa  from Sydney and Philippa who lives here in Auckland - and to see how wonderfully well they have fared.

It is a marvellous coincidence that Thursday of this week marks the 14^th anniversary of Peter’s London Bookshops farewell function at Highwic here in Auckland. And it is also around 48 years since Peter joined his elder brother David at London Bookshops the business their father had founded.

So Peter we are celebrating  your 70^th birthday along with the anniversary of your entry to and retirement from the book trade and at the same time we are recalling the very significant and widely admired contribution you made to the NZ book scene over many years

An appropriate way to acknowledge these milestones is for me to read out messages that have come in from old friends and former colleagues:

 

BIRTHDAY MESSAGES

         

You're far too young to be having significant birthdays. Many of us look back at 70 with some fondness so buck up there's a long way to go.

Best wishes for a happy day.

David and Susan Heap

Wilf and Richard Beckett send their best wishes for Peter’s  70^th – warmly remembered as a talented retailer who would show his heels to current booksellers if he and David were still in business!

 Hearty congratulations and best wishes for a fantastic 70^th birthday.

 We all still miss you in the trade. Apart from your infectious enthusiasm, outstanding leadership qualities and passion for good, commercial books, the void left by the disappearance of London Bookshops from the market has never ever been filled and remains vacant to this day.

Hope you enjoy your special day.

Good boy! (How many times will that be said tonight!)

Tony Fisk and all at HarperCollins

 Happy birthday twin, 10^th March was a great day when we arrived...but getting older is a b...er.  All the best and have fun at your celebration   John Blackwell

Happy birthday, Peter, and very kind regards.

Must say, I didn't realise how young you are.

Best wishes

John Griffin

Hello Peter and Carole

What can I say but "good boy, good boy"!

Have a wonderful 70th birthday celebration with your friends and family.

Best wishes

Sue Beaton

Congratulations Peter

I just can't get my head around the fact of you being 70 and it being 40 years since our great times at Kirks! Where have the years gone? Enjoy the occasion and have a wonderful evening. Would love to be there.

My very best

Perry Lennon

Congratulations, Peter, and happy birthday. It’s hard to believe you’re 70 - I still vividly remember those good old London Bookshops days when you hadn’t even reached 40. And now you’re getting awfully close to the time when it will take you longer to get over a good time than to have it!

Very best wishes from us both,

Kate and Graham Fortune

Dear Peter,

MAH-z’l-tawv!!!  It is hard to realize that you have reached this wonderful milestone and now join the venerable, along with brother David, David Elworthy and Bob Ross……

Your infectious sense of humour, canny appraisal of the New Zealand market and enduring interest and support for a struggling book distributor are indelibly etched in my memory.  Thank you so much.

Warmest best wishes for a splendid 70^th birthday bash..

Shalom Aleichem.

Paul Greenberg & Joan Roulston

Happy Birthday Peter –

Would have loved to have been in Auckland this week., I have to be in Wellington – where I will of course be thinking of you – as it was there we first met nearly 40 years ago.

I have very fond memoirs of many years of doing business with you. I always admired the way you ran your business and you were always a genuine pleasure to deal with – I remain grateful to you for the strong support you showed to Jane and I when we were developing the Godwit list. The London Bookshops order often made a real difference to our ability to publish what we wanted to.

Sadly LBS is no more – and we are all the poorer for it. Actually that may not be strictly true in your case….

Your contribution to the New Zealand book trade for so many years will always be remembered so there is only one more thing I can say - and I suspect it may have been said by others.

Good Boy Good boy – well done.

Brian Phillips

Hello, Peter,

 A very Happy 70th Birthday to you.  Are you sure you're only 70? You seemed so much older and wiser than us when we first met you almost 40 years ago!

With our very best wishes, (& to Carole too).

 Bruce & Janis Caddy, Dunedin

Many congratulations, Peter, and love to you and Carole from us both. It hardly seems like 36 years ago that you and David were first so hospitable to a barbarian Penguin. We’ll raise a glass ( Waimea Pinot Noir 2008 to be exact) to you tonight.

 Every best wish to you both. Patrick and Judy Wright

Happy birthday Peter. As I reflect on the very convivial times we had way back then it occurs to me how very different bookselling is today. All the best from Joan and me to you and Carole,

Lou Bennett – I am 8 years ahead of you by the way!

Hi Peter and happy birthday. Hi to you too Carole. Remembering the good times and friendship we shared back then, and the wonderful time we had at those Wairakei conferences.

Nadia and Pearce Brooke-Anderson, (80 years of age)

Happy birthday Peter, you are still just a young fellow as I am 84 this year.

Warm good wishes to you and Carole,

Bob Stables

Happy birthday Peter, and warmest good wishes from Pam and me, I have many memories of those happy days in the trade over so many years.

Ray Goddard

I think these messages illustrate very well the fondness and great respect with which Peter is held by people in the book industry.

Photo shows left to right - Philip King, Annie Beattie, Peter Emanuel,Sarah Lovell-Smith, Bookman Beattie.

Good boy Peter, and Happy Birthday!!