Pub Sign Photo Study – The Moon Under Water – Wigan

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There are several pubs bearing the name Moon Under Water, supposedly based on the Moonrakers’s legend of drunks seeing the moon reflected in a lake after dark and thinking it was drowning. In some versions of the story the men end up in the water themselves before realizing how stupid they are. The pub name first actually appears in a short essay by George (1984) Orwell, who also wrote famously about Wigan Pier. His Moon Under Water essay argues about what makes The Moon Under Water a perfect pub, including a quiet place to smoke, drinking beer from China cups and freedom from loud music. Orwell ends the essay with a twist, pointing out that his Moon Under Water does not actually exist and no pub really fulfils his ideals as a perfect drinking establishment. Trying to find the perfect pub becomes a folly on par with trying to rescue the Moon’s reflection. The Wetherspoon’s pub chain set out to create their idea of an ideal pub and named several pubs The Moon Under Water to suggest that they get closer than most to meeting Orwell’s exacting criteria. This one in Wigan, itself so associated with the great writer, has one of the finest pub sign depictions of moonlight on water available. Arthur Chappell