Panel 17: Gosh! Comics

Panel 17: Gosh! Comics

I've already pointed you in the direction of Orbital Comics in the Cartoon & Comic Book Tour of London. And before my 20-part series ends, you should also check out Gosh!

Gosh! is not only a great comic book store – well-stocked and friendly – but their events are top notch, too. Visit their website (see below) to keep up with their signings, talks and workshops.

There has been a Gosh! comic book store in London for as long as I can remember. Its former home was near the British Museum but it can currently be found doing its bit for turning back the tide of corporate dullness in Soho.

Another thing to love about Gosh! is that they give pride of place to indy comics, right at the top of the stairs – you can't miss 'em if you're heading down to the comic book and back issues section. Support your local comic book store and support your local comic book artists and creators at the same time.

Soho itself provides rich pickings for cartoons and their creators. Being an iconoclasts' paradise Soho is a natural home for cartoonists – Private Eye is based here (see earlier blog post). The defining events of 19th Century Soho, the cholera epidemics, also inspired some famous and angry cartoons. Perhaps most famous of all is A Court for King Cholera…

… by John Leech, published in Punch 1852. Twenty years earlier George Cruikshank had already poked fun at a profiteering medical profession in an earlier outbreak of the disease…

The Gosh! website is at www.goshlondon.com

1 Berwick Street, 

Soho, 

London 

W1F 0DR

Open 10.30am – 7pm

Seven days a week