Richard Booth

Richard George William Pitt Booth (12 September 1938 – 20 August 2019) was a British bookseller, bibliophile and literary publicist.

Seated at Hay Castle, and a scion of the ancient Cheshire family, Booth established Hay-on-Wye as a literary centre becoming the self-proclaimed King of Hay.

Appointed MBE in 2004 for "services to tourism", Booth paved the way for the Hay Literary Festival.

Early life Booth was born in Plymouth, England in 1938. He was attended Rugby School and the University of Oxford. As a child, his father, an army officer, would take him to book stores, which fostered his love of reading. After his family inherited the Brynmelyn estate, they moved to Hay.

Literary award

In 2014, Booth gave his name to an annual literary award in association with the Hay Writers' Circle. Judges and winners of the Richard Booth Prize for Non-Fiction include:

Politics Booth stood unsuccessfully for the Socialist Labour Party as a prospective AM candidate at the 1999 Welsh Assembly elections and for Wales constituency MEP at the 2009 European Parliament elections.

Welsh Assembly elections Year Region Party Votes % Result 1999 Mid and West Wales SLP 3,019 1.4 Not elected

European Parliament elections Year Region Party Votes % Result Notes 2009 Wales SLP 12,402 1.8 Not elected Multi-member constituency; party list

Booth effigy beheading In 2009, a revolt was held against the "King" by so-called republicans, led by bookseller and proprietor of Oxford House Books, Paul Harris, who journalist Sean Dodson called a "Cromwell figure". He was former employee of Booth's, reported as being "tutored at the knee" of the self-declared regent and helping him move large "lorry loads" of books from the United States to the UK, in an on-off "love/hate" working relationship that lasted over a decade. Despite Harris's leading of a trial of treason and symbolic "beheading" of Booth, they "remained on good terms".

Harris argued that Booth, a promotional figurehead of the town due to his self-declared kingship, had been negligent in promoting the issues of the booksellers over the festival. He told the press in 2009, "You can fill a town with books, but that won't bring people to the town[...] You need publicity and promotion, which is now all sucked up by the festival. Richard used to be great at drumming up publicity and denouncing the festival. He's not able to do that any more, so we need to set up a council to replace him." Another of the to-be commonwealth, bookseller and "Witchfinder General" Peter "Boz" Harries agreed, arguing that Booth had failed in his crown duty, adding, "We think this is a natural continuation. There are one or two locals who think it is rather cruel, but when Richard had his coronation in the 1970s a lot of locals were vehemently against him." with the rebels dressed as Roundheads and the pro-Booth Royalists like Cavaliers (contrary to his Booth family history). Paul Harris led the charge, and applause and jeers from the peripheries of the Butter Market could be heard when the fake head of Booth rolled into the bucket.