Memoir of a cycle courier set in London (“swerve, brake or die”)

17th March 2016

What goes Around by Emily Chappell, memoir of a cycle courier set in London.

Ever wondered what it is like to be a cycle courier in London? And a female one at that? Emily gives up her predetermined life in academia to work initially as one of two females in a courier company in the capital. As anyone can imagine, it is a hard job through all the seasons, from the biting winds and rain of the Winter months, through the irritations of plane tree pollen in Spring, to the heat of Summer. And of course the vagaries and at times vitriolic behaviour of other road users is undeniable. It is a profession that is ‘unseen’ by most of us and one whose companion is constant solitude. The life of a cycle courier is certainly not for the faint-hearted!

At first I wasn’t altogether sure that this was a memoir for me. The wheels seem to turn relatively slowly in the early part. It was a solid – well written – and at times a didactic read about the nature of bikes and cycling; who favours a freewheel as opposed to a fixed gear. A Salsa Cyclocross or Surly Steamroller didn’t mean anything to me.

But soon the speed picked up and I found myself rooting for this young woman, whose vulnerability and self effacing demeanour belied the steely exterior of a typical cycle courier, who might cover 1000 miles a week.

I really warmed to the writer when she chose novels to read in the periods when she had no packages to deliver. In terms of TripFiction I was delighted to find that she chose several London-set books, including Iris Murdoch’s “Under the Net“. Descriptions of the Holborn Viaduct contained in that book enabled her to look afresh at this area of London, where the city folds in half, with the River Fleet running far below. In addition Alan Hollinghurst’s The Swimming-Pool Library inspired her to search for Lord Nantwich’s house; and finally Sebastian Faulks gets short shrift in his novel A Week in December “.. [a] novel that attempts to represent London’s bustle and diversity by amassing a disparate and thinly drawn cast, just about their only uniting feature being that they are all, at one point or another, set upon by a speeding cyclist”. Indeed there are plenty of people in the city who rail against the cycle courier, for, well, no real reason,other than the cyclists are vulnerable targets (i.e. not encased in a car), ubiquitous, are perceived to get in the way, and  thus easy prey to vent spleen?

Much of the writing is actually about the author’s inner self, someone who struggles with quite some self doubt. When she first meets one of her partner’s old friends and lovers (difficult of course) she worried herself into the ground that she would be judged and found wanting. And of course being in a male dominated community has its own difficulties.

It was good to see the anecdotes of life on two wheels start to build up, including a delivery to Downing Street and a missing package (luckily not one of Emily’s deliveries) worth £10 million. Driving past the Broadwick Street Pump she spots tour guides informing and misinforming the London visitor about how Dr John Snow traced cholera to this exact pump in 1854… And indeed there are the Cycle Messenger World Championships, who knew?

London is brought to life in the author’s capable hands, and a potentially overwhelming city becomes manageable through familiarity – “Places and spaces change with knowledge. They shrink, and become habitable and negotiable“. Emily certainly conveys this in this memoir. “The strange and seductive satisfaction of courieuring” that Emily describes means that I will observe these streaking human dynamos in a new light…

Tina for the TripFiction Team

Emily very kindly agreed to answer our questions:

TF: What Goes Around felt like a very novel way to explore the life of a cycle courier and the streets of London. What prompted you to put your experiences into book form?

EC: I wrote a blog for a long time, and people often told me I should turn it into a book. But I was worried that I’d be profiting as an individual from experiences that belonged to a community, and thought it would be better if someone else wrote the book, or if there were an anthology, to showcase the diversity of voices in the courier world. In the end a literary agent approached me, and managed to convince me that I could write a book that stayed true to this, and actually helped to amplify courier voices, rather than erasing them. Whether or not I’ve succeeded – well, that’s up to the other couriers! If you meet any of them around London, ask them what they think of my book.

TF: The book itself – presentation, flaps and cover all feel like a real quality read. How much input did you have into the design?

EC: I wasn’t responsible for the cover design – it was the talent of Tom Radclyffe that created those brilliant line drawings, and the slanting design that makes your eyes go funny if you stare at it too long. But I was allowed to influence (and ultimately veto) what it looked like, and I was very keen that the book wouldn’t be made to look overtly ‘feminine’. Despite the fact that I’m not the least bit girly, people have always had a tendency to assume that everything I do, I do ‘as a woman’ and I didn’t want to fuel that assumption any further. The portrait of me on the rear flap was provided by fellow ex-courier Selim Korycki, and I was very pleased and proud to have a contribution from someone who’s shared many of the same experiences, and whose work I have always admired.

TF: Cycle couriers have been very much part of the fabric of London life, overlooked by many in the capital (as you describe in your book). What is the future do you feel as other forms of communication develop?

EC: It’s funny you should say couriers are overlooked, because sometimes it seems everyone’s talking about them. I’ve been part of the courier world for nearly a decade now, and that whole time there’s been this idea that couriers are ‘unseen’ and ‘undiscovered’; that they inhabit a secret world, hiding in the cracks of the real one. Surely by now they would have come out into the open! Perhaps it’s just that people like the idea of a parallel universe.

But as for the future – well, courier life will change, and that’s inevitable. It’s already changed quite a lot, since the pre-internet days, where virtually everything had to go by bike. And with change will always come loss. Some of the industries that used to be our bread and butter don’t need us any more, and some of the well-loved courier stereotypes (such as the muscular young man shooting through the traffic on his fixed-gear bike) are starting to become less common. Now there are more cargo bikes (which are slower and less glamorous), and bicycles are being used to deliver things like food and flowers. I think there will always be a demand for things to be delivered by bike – possibly more than ever before, as awareness grows of the need for (and the benefits of) sustainable transport – but the cycle courier as we know her might well change beyond recognition.

TF: Cycling seems to be very much part of your life – whether adventuring around Japan and other foreign countries, or working in London. What has been the highlight of your experiences? What might be your next adventure, whether cycle-related/writing?

EC: It’s impossible to choose just one highlight! Since I took up cycling (ten years ago now) I’ve spent many years working as a courier, cycled across Asia, cycled through Iceland, Alaska and Canada in winter, and taken up ultra-distance racing. I think the overall highlight is realising just how much my body is capable of, thanks to the bicycle – and thanks to couriering too, which was probably one of my life’s main turning points.

My next adventure – well, my current adventure – is my ongoing obsession with ultra-distance races: events where I’ll ride up to 200 miles a day for days or weeks at a time. Until just a couple of years ago I would never have thought I’d be capable of this – now I’m excited to see how far I’ll be able to go.

TF: You gave up an academic career to work as a cycle courier. Any regrets?

EC: Not at all! For a while I felt that leaving academia was a failure, and had plans to get back in that grew vaguer and vaguer until eventually they died off completely. And now I look at my former colleagues, who managed to get funding and carry on, and many of them are miserable – their intellectual fire has been almost entirely smothered by unreasonable teaching demands, departmental politics, and the ‘publish or perish’ mentality. Very sadly, I feel that academia may no longer be the best place for a curious mind to flourish. Mine, at least, only truly came to life after I left.

TF: You describe quite some change in the capital, and remark on this in the book. The change, of course, continues apace. Which are the buildings/areas you marvel at in the city, and which do you personally dislike; in other words what is London gaining, but what is London also losing in your personal opinion?

EC: The buildings I particularly dislike are those that use so called ‘defensive architecture’ to discourage undesirables (like homeless people, skateboarders, and of course cycle couriers) from loitering. Over the years quite a few of the places where couriers used to sit between jobs have been redesigned to keep us away, and to my mind this makes the city a more unfriendly, less human place.

Some of the buildings I like most are the really old ones, like the fragments of ancient churches and city walls tucked in amongst the skyscrapers of the City. They remind me that, although much has come and gone, there are things that will always remain.

TF: At TripFiction we are driven by books that are strong on locale and were really pleased to see that you chose to read books set in London: Iris Murdoch’s Under the Net, which motivated you to take another in depth look at Holborn Viaduct and that Alan Hollinghurst’s The Swimming Pool Library inspired you to seek out Lord Nantwich’s House (absolutely what we are about!). What kind of books do you generally like to read….?

EC: I read absolutely everything, but like TripFiction I have a bit of fetish for reading books in the place where they were set – and seeing how they echo (or clash with) what I see around me. Getting to know London in such detail as a cycle courier made reading London-based books even more rewarding.

TF:  You must know London inside out. What are your top tips for a visitor to the city?

EC: It’s much better to explore London under your own steam (on foot or by bike) than to limit yourself to public transport. Have a look at the map, and always choose a small street over a big one. And look out for all of London’s hidden parks and squares – you’ll very easily find some treasures that most of the tourist hordes miss out on.

Thank you to Emily for her wonderful responses. You can follow her and her trips on Twitter and via her website

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