Sabbaticalette

Day 7 -- Dorset uber alles

This was my Sylvia Townsend Warner day... If you don't know who STW is, you'll soon find out...

Sylvia was writing at much the same time Virginia Woolf was -- garnering far less fame, but living on, and living well, into the seventies. At one time, she was the writer who had had more stories published in the New Yorker than any other -- I think, into the hundreds. Her first novel, Lolly Willowes (about an Edwardian maiden lady's unique response to the boredom of her life among her brother's family), was the first Book of the Month Club selection.

After some ill-advised dabbling in heterosexuality, she settled down to a life-long, passionate partnership with Valentine Ackland, a younger woman who aspired to poetry. Their relationship was not always easy -- Valentine struggled with both alcoholism and frustration that her writing career never took off as Sylvia's did -- but it was always intensely held and enormously sustaining to each woman.

Each of Sylvia's novels was singular in subject and style -- from Mr. Fortune's Maggot (the tale of a nineteenth century missionary in Polynesia who discovers that his one convert is no convert at all) to The Corner That Held Them (chronicling a medieval convent over a series of decades; in her own words, "there is practically no love in the book, and no religion, but a great deal of financial worry and ambition and loneliness and sensitivity to weather, with practically no sensitivity to nature. If you have no sensibility to nature the rain seems much wetter, the cold much colder, etc. It is not in any way a historical novel.") She wrote a tender but unflinching biography of T.H. White, and in the last years of her life, crushed by grief after Valentine's death, wrote some of the most original, startling and believable stories of the faerie folk ever to grace our language.

I wish that the word "humane" was stronger praise in our culture, for Sylvia was the most humane writer I know -- able to depict human foible and fraility with devastatingly gentle, ruthless wit, always affectionate, always authentic. There are lines upon lines in her stories that still make me laugh, after a dozen readings -- she describes two callow lovers at the altar, "Olivia and Olivia's gigolo, bandying their vows" -- it kills me every time. When I need to be both stimulated and calmed, I turn to her letters and diaries -- the surety and depth of the style, the savoir vivre of the woman herself, always bring me to a deeper and happier sense of my own self.

In the midst of the country where she led most of her life, I headed off down extremely narrow lanes margined by high banks of wildflowers. Whenever I drove into a stretch of trees, it was like diving into the center of a lettuce. Made my way to Frome Vauchurch, outside of Maiden Newton, to see if I can spot STW's house by the river. Well, I did spot it, but I don't know which of three was hers, and it was too narrow to stop and take a picture of any of them. Oh well.

Headed into Dorchester, the local market town -- first order of business, getting some cash, then to the Dorset County Museum, one of those jumbly little folklife museums I adore, where they display whatever anybody's given them, with lovingly hand-lettered cards attached. Lady at reception desk had never heard of STW, but told me correct pronunciation is Froooom (in Frome Vauchurch). So there you go.

Well, there's a wall for Alfred Stevens, "Dorset's Michelangelo", who from humble beginnings ended up designing the Duke of Wellington's monument. There's a Victorian dollhouse -- we are gravely informed that Blockhead the butler met a fiery death in the nursery fire. You have enlightened vicars making sketches of neolithic remains -- Victorian privies -- replicas of turn-of-the-century brewing apparatus -- a breastplate from the Civil War, complete with musket hole -- Viking ingots -- Saxon sword fragments -- Roman coins and a mosaic on the floor -- a broadside detailing the tragic, cautionary tale of someone hung for stealing sheep (his last words a pious hope that others would learn from his bitter fate) -- the Tolpuddle Martyrs -- all snuggled together with cheerful promiscuity.

Archaeological gallery both newer and more scholarly -- though difficult to navigate chronologically, and inordinate amount of verbiage spent in lamenting that farmers will go around plowing their fields and ruining everything.

Then the Writers Room -- all the Powys family (must remember to tell Pam about seeing manuscript of Glastonbury Romance). At last what I'm most interested in -- the STW cases. Original manuscripts and diary pages, in lovely near illegible scrawl. (Wish my nearly illegible scrawl was so pretty...) They had some of the little decorated cards STW and Valentine Ackland made for each other, slipping them into jacket pockets-- for happy occasions, to remind the beloved to keep warm or eat well, or just love. A portrait by Cecil Beaton -- all the mylar in the world couldn't make her look glamorous!

Hardy, of course, has pride of place -- but (heresy!) I don't really care for Hardy much.

In the temporary exhibition space, a fabulous set of photographs by pioneer Helen Muspratt. She used this fascinating "solarisation" technique on photos in the 20's and 30's. Included a portrait of Alistair Cooke looking younger than you thought he could possibly ever be. Roger Fry again. John Cornford, the first Briton killed in the Spanish Civil War -- and his girlfriend Ray Peters -- very intense. Pictures of Corfe Castle's Dunshay players (see Hilda Spencer Watson) -- I think sylphs traditionally don't wear socks under their sandals...

Picked up some souvenirs -- STW's Dorset Stories and a Dorset Archaelogical Society pen (oh, I'll be the envy of all my friends!) -- a few necessities from Boots, and off to Sherborne Abbey... with a quick stop at Cerne Abbas. (Is that a cudgel in your hand, or are you just happy to see me? Rumor is that it might be meant to be Cromwell -- I'd have more respect for the Lord Protector if I'd known he was in charge of that much weaponry.)

Liked Sherborne much better than Winchester -- lovely light yellow stone. Organ playing throughout visit. Stained glass colors as fresh as morning rain, a blend of old and new. I had a picture of the Mary chapel's etched glass by Whistler, but photography doesn't do it justice -- very delicate and mysterious. Carved seats in the quire, very like St. Bertrand de Comminges. Mermaid boss on perpendicular fanwork ceiling. Purchased a little Mary icon -- they have trustingly left a little box for folks to make payment on the honor system.

Have late lunch in bright bistro, all pale wood and white counters -- delicious lamb kefta and salad with lemon vinagrette. Get home early without incident -- don't even need to invoke Mrs. Longford -- and have a nap.

Back to splash page

Back to day six

Forward to day eight