Problems All Left Alone — The Persevere, Leith
When I walk into a near-empty Persevere on a drizzly Leith weekday, its vastness swallows me up like a whale.
Moments later, when I gingerly take my pint of Newbarns Pale Ale to the table and sit in one of the half-boothed banquettes, a feeling of tranquility comes over me. My initial fear of being gulped up by a sea monster, like Ahab or Pinocchio, abates. Instead it feels like I’m resting in a Victorian barque’s cabin, navigating the doldrums.
I glance at paintings that look weathered for centuries and the clutter of barrelled seating and wonder how a pub this size can be so vast, yet so cosy. How can a one-roomed pub segregate my feelings in this way? It's not exactly an off-kilter liminal space, more like a hidden building in a drowned town.
“A good pub is what you bring to it yourself,” says Edinburgh-based journalist Imran Rahman-Jones. “But it also has to have a community feeling. It’s the mixture of the individual and the collective together that makes the Persevere work.”
Photography by Jonny Hamilton
There are two definitions of ‘persevere’ that both equally fit this Easter Road pub that in turn takes its name from the one-word motto that adorns Leith’s coat of arms. The first is to achieve greatness in spite of difficulty.
“It has its own identity but it’s adapted to changes in the local community while maintaining its own unique perspective,” Leith local Gordon Banks tells me.
““A good pub is what you bring to it yourself.””
While other nearby pubs seem to change hands regularly, such as the Volunteer (AKA the Volly, the Mouse Trap and now the Dog House,) or target a specific young professional group—the Old Eastway Tap, for example, turns away Hibs supporters on match day if a flash of a scarf is seen under a coat—the Persevere manages to, well, persevere in offering fans a warm welcome.
It does so by still feeling traditional, which means it retains those born and bred in Edinburgh’s historically working class Leith district, especially sports lovers who might glance at the horse racing before a match. While it also serves as a home away from home for many of the Polish diaspora who have been linked to the port since 1939.
This is seen in the pub's owners, Lublin-born Dorota Czerniec-Radowska and her husband Konrad Rochowski, and the kitchen they have run since 2015 which pumps out delicacies, such as plate-sized schnitzels and comforting white sausage (Żurek) soup. You can eat these in the pub or the restaurant-style section, known as the Percy (also the affectionate nickname given to the pub by its regulars,) where paintings of Dorota and Konrad’s hometown are displayed.
The second definition is down to its continued ability to exist despite a difficult or changing situation. “You walk into the pub and it feels like it’s been there forever,” Gordon says.
It hasn’t, though. That old time, Victorian feel I mentioned, was in fact created in 1992. While other pubs were becoming identikit by stripping out the carpets and the old wood, the Persevere charted a different course with then owner, Kevin Doyle, and righthand man Graeme Arnott deciding to go back to a previous century when designing the interior.
They also commissioned the five paintings to foster a retro aesthetic and these were the work of New Town resident Kenny Skeel—it's odd to think that ‘Mary Queen of Scots Landing at Leith Pier 1561’ was probably painted when MasterChef or Countdown was on the TV.
In fact, the building became a pub in 1974, converted from a former Co-Op and butcher’s, with the only remnant from this era being the ceiling cornice, according to Edinburgh-based CAMRA member Michael Slaughter.
In fact, both Imran and Henry Kirk, founder of Sunken Knave brewery, both assumed it was Victorian, with the former having to issue a correction. “Wow. Well that’s news to me. I learned a lot about Leith history from those paintings,” Henry tells me.
It’s all the more surprising because Hibs supporter Henry has been going to the Persevere for many years—in early 2010s when they still served Scottish breakfasts—and would press gang friends to take the long walk there while he was studying a BSc in brewing and distilling at Edinburgh’s Heriot Watt University.
“Part of its appeal is you can sneak in and you’re outside of the world and your responsibilities,” he says.
““Part of its appeal is you can sneak in and you’re outside of the world and your responsibilities.””
That the pub draws football fans before a Hibs match, though, is very inclusive because it also attracts families there for the excellent food and some of these will be the youngest attendees at Easter Road Stadium—in Scotland, children in pubs is rarer than south of the border because of licensing laws which mean under-14s can’t really visit wet-led pubs in Scotland.
For pub-regular Gordon this means the Persevere is tied to his adulthood, especially as his dad was a real-life John Rebus, working in the city as a CID detective, much like the character of Ian Rankin’s literary creation. In reality, this meant certain pubs were avoided by the Bankses just in case they would run into anyone that could be arrested in the future.
“Going to the pub with my dad was never part of my upbringing,” Gordon says.
But despite the Persevere serving fans wearing the green and white of Hibs, Gordon believes it never feels overwhelming like a football boozer. There’s no chanting, and it’s not a particularly male space, even on matchdays.
It’s humble. It’s also understated—so much so the owners and bar manager, Paul, were too reticent to speak to me for this article, despite months of pestering.
“I think [Paul] is quite shy,” Gordon says. “He’s kind of like that in the pub—he’s friendly but not over the top. I don’t mean this disparagingly but it’s functional friendliness—the level of friendliness to get your job done.
“I don’t like friendliness forced on me when I’m having a pint after work. So it’s the level of friendliness I appreciate.”
Imran, with his newsletter laser-focussed on Edinburgh pubs, is the best person to ask how this welcome helps rank the pub among the likes of the famous Blue Blazers, Cloisters, and Kay’s Bar. He says it's up there because it’s forever linked to memories of when he first arrived in the city.
“The dark-wood interior is very warm and it’s a very welcoming, homely kind of place,” he tells me.
I meet Gordon, Imran and their friends in the Percy for a few pints and a meal. We enjoyed white mountains of mash—reminding me of Arthur’s Seat in a blizzard—plonked alongside pulverised schnitzels, and a baton of a chicken kiev oozing gooey goodness. It was indulgent, but wholesome, lovingly prepared and brought to our table like a series of love letters to Polish cuisine by the coy manager, Paul.
The Newbarns Pale Ale I had cost just £4.70, (it’s £5.50 at their taproom, and £7.10 in some other local bars.) But this soon gives way to pint after pint of snowy-peaked Tennant’s lager, as chat becomes king and I’m forced into hearing about the travails of Hibs.
As the night moves on the pub, with its wide-brimmed whale maw swallowing up more drinkers, fills to bursting. At the end of the evening, the bell rings, it sneezes, and we depart like Pinnochios and Geppettos into Leith’s salty sea air.
It’s hospitality on a grand—but understated—scale. It’s the best of Scotland. And the best of Poland.
