BE AT ONE
BE AT ONE - A LITERARY LONDON BAR
The Be at One is a Stonegate chain bar, serving cocktails, that stands opposite the Windmill (Tables & Dancing) Nightclub and directly adjacent to Werner’s primary school. It was formally the Red Lion of Soho. Pride rainbow flags are displayed out the front.
The décor inside is non-descript. The clientele predominantly young. Werner?commented: ‘It looks like a pick up joint.’ He paused, ‘A gay pick-up joint.’ I wondered how many people were here for the 2-4-1 deal on the cocktails.
At the bar, I ordered, ‘Two Jack Roses, please.’ The Jack Rose was John Steinbeck’s cocktail of choice. Unfortunately, the Jack Rose was not on the menu so I tried, ‘Okay, how about two Mojitos instead.’ The Mojito was Ernest Hemingway’s cocktail of choice.
As our Mojitos were being made, the bargirl and I chatted about the Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels literary connections to the building and she recommended to me this book: Heather Parry’s Orpheus Builds Girl.
The Communist League held their second congress, at?Great Windmill Street, in November and December 1847. Both Marx and Engels attended and then went on to write an ‘action programme’ for The Communist League in a room above the bar. When published in 1848 this programme was entitled The Communist Manifesto. 70 years later, The Communist Manifesto was the basis for the Russian Revolution and formation of the Soviet Union. In the years 1850-51, when Marx was lived in Dean Street, he gave lectures on Economics?in the room above the bar. This room is now a flat.
If you liked this article,?there are other London literary pubs listed here.