East of England
Orford Ness, Suffolk: Robert MacFarlane
‘Nowhere has drawn me back more often’ ‘It has become a sort of Tintern Abbey for the contemporary’ ‘A metonym for a state we are now in, a clash and crisis and juxtaposition’ The Inspiration for this walk: ‘Ness’ 2018 It was Robert Macfarlane’s ‘Mountains of the Mind’ that first grabbed my imagination, but there […]
Little Gidding, Cambridgeshire: TS Eliot
The inspiration for this trip: ‘The Four Quartets’ TS Eliot seemed the most iconic of poets when I was at school. I saved up for the Faber Complete Poems & Plays, whilst my parents splashed out on this very grand Folio Society edition. I recall we got a Folio Society book every three months or […]
Inspiring Places: The River Cam, Cambridge
‘In Arcadia’; ‘That was our place’ KEY DATA Terrain: easy going Starting point: Trumpington Park & Ride, 43 Hauxton Rd, CB2 9FT (take the bus into the city centre first, then return here on foot from Byron’s Pool via Consort Avenue) Distance: 6.8 km (4.3 miles) Time: 1 hr 45 mins OS Map: OS Explorer […]
Helpston, Cambridgeshire: John Clare
‘Everything about the place, in fact, which made it precisely this place, and not that one, was forgotten’ KEY DATA Terrain: no contours, excellent paths Starting point: Woodgate, Helpston (PE6 7ED) Distance: 6 km (4.1 miles) Time: 1hr 42 mins OS Map: Explorer 235. The map can also be found at https://explore.osmaps.com/en/route/10644761/Helpston-Cambridgeshire-John-Clare Facilities: Pub, village shop […]
Ayot St Lawrence, Hertfordshire: George Bernard Shaw
‘Walk! Not bloody likely!’ SHAW’S CORNER Shaw’s Corner was George Bernard Shaw’s home for over 40 years, from 1906 to his death in 1950; and because he left his estate to the National Trust, much of the house is preserved just as he left it, making it easy to imagine his life there. The house […]
Akenfield (Charsfield) Suffolk: Ronald Blythe
‘A natural conversation’ The inspiration for this walk… Akenfield I first read Akenfield twenty or more years ago and it has held a tight grip on my perception of the countryside ever since. It just seemed so very believable – there was as much emotionally damaging about the claustrophobic, inward-looking world of early twentieth century […]
© 2024 Literary Rambles
Recent Comments