Happy Christmas from Lacock The Abbey’s Great Hall and cloisters are beautifully dressed for the season, with decorations inspired by a Fox Talbot family Christmas in 1845. Why not try one of the lovely comfortable Windsor chairs, modern copies in the style of Chippendale, and toast your toes by the log fire. No mulled wine… Read More 2014
Literary Links to Tuscany Fascinated to learn that writer and poet Dame Muriel Spark, best known for novels such as Memento Mori (1959), The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1961) and The Girls of Slender Means (1961) lived for the last thirty years of her life in San Giovanni di Oliveto, a converted presbytery near… Read More Muriel Spark in Civitella
25 November 2013 Visited Aldbourne Library on Monday evening for a book signing of The Little Book of Wiltshire which is just out. What a lovely, welcoming place it is! And it’s the smallest library in Wiltshire – sorry, I didn’t put it in my book. The village is very fortunate to have been able… Read More 2013
Here’s why you should. Anne Tyler, an Elegant Soul Jottings from my Reading Journal I discovered the American author, Anne Tyler, in 1990 when I read Breathing Lessons (1988) which won the Pullitzer Prize in 1989. I didn’t immediately latch on to her writing but reread it five years later. My reading journal records: ‘Completely… Read More Have you read Anne Tyler?
Sweet Music Marden House, Calne, 3 November 2012 Review of ‘Song of Life’s Joy’ a dramatic presentation on the life and work of Frederick Delius by David Stone The sound of sonatas, tone poems and operatic arias filled the hall at Marden House, Calne last Saturday night, competing with the whizz and bang of fireworks… Read More 2012: a year of Delius, September 11, Puritans, rain, topiary and barrage balloons
I picked up this postcard at an antiques fair because of the Wiltshire connection. The caption reads: Col: Cody & winning Biplane, Lark Hill. I knew the name Cody from Buffalo Bill but was there a connection to the Wild West? Samuel Franklin Cody (1861-1913) aka ‘the Colonel’ was a showman and aeronautical designer who… Read More Wiltshire Connections
