“I was born here (in a town), I live here now (in a city). A city that is a seaside resort. A seaside resort that is a city. A city that has a reputation for tolerance, for permissiveness, for scuzziness, for petty crime, for shingle, for improving your health, for ruining your health. It’s a city where you can be a freak and not feel like a freak.”

We’ve all got the idea if not the facts straight about the idiosyncrasies of Brighton, and Orlando Gough’s portrait and memoir of this seaside city seeks to fill in the gaps. Taking the form of short episodes which move back and forth between past and present, his investigation summons up the spirits of the people who have played their parts, both in reality and in fiction. The book disentangles Brighton’s contrasts and connections, the fluctuations between its architectural landscape and the natural world, the variety and complexions of its many sounds and voices.

Orlando Gough is a composer—and sometimes lyricist, librettist, cookery writer—who writes operas and choral music, makes music for dance and theatre, and creates large scale outdoor events.

Photograph by Boyd Webb, 2021