Our tours cover more than 200 fascinating sites associated with 75 of England’s best-known novelists, playwrights and poets. However, you might be surprised by some of the writers we’ve included. That’s because, regardless of the writer’s renown, there’s an associated site that has great appeal.
Take Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) – actually a native of Scotland – who might be best known for “The French Revolution: A History” (the inspiration for Charles Dickens’ “A Tale of Two Cities”). He’s included in our list because his house in London’s elegant Chelsea district, lovingly preserved and maintained by the National Trust(1), stands not only as a memorial to the man but also as a faithful reminder of the times in which he lived.
Or take Gilbert White (1720-1793) – a pioneer of natural history, best remembered for his classic book “The Natural History and Antiquities of Selborne”. He’s also included in our list because his family home in Hampshire – not far from Jane Austen’s home – has been carefully restored and the wonderful garden has been recreated in the manner of White’s original design. Unquestionably, Gilbert White’s house is a unique national treasure.
On the other hand, many renowned writers have little more than a statue (or other memorial) and a grave to remember them by. Notable examples include Geoffrey Chaucer (c1343-1400), EM Forster (1879-1970), TS Eliot (1888-1965), JRR Tolkien (1892-1973) and George Orwell (1903-1950).
For HG Wells (1866-1946) there’s only a statue: after his death in 1946 his body was cremated and the ashes scattered at sea. For Oscar Wilde (who was, of course, Irish and is famously buried in Paris) there is, in England, only a statue and a memorial window in Poets’ Corner in Westminster Abbey, London(2).
Others have only a grave to celebrate their memory – except perhaps for a blue plaque(3) here or there. Notable examples include Joseph Conrad (1857-1924) (Heart of Darkness), Arthur Ransome (1884-1967) (Swallows and Amazons), Aldous Huxley (1894-1963) (Brave New World) and Evelyn Waugh (1903-1966) (Brideshead Revisited). Unfortunately these and many others cannot be included in our list.
For some there’s not even a burial site, let alone a statue or other memorial. For example, after his death in 1965, the body of playwright W Somerset Maugham (Of Human Bondage, The Razor’s Edge) was cremated and the ashes scattered in the grounds of The King’s School, Canterbury. Nor are there English memorials for PG Wodehouse (1881-1975) (creator of Bertie Wooster and his inimitable valet Jeeves) whose grave is in the United States or for Graham Greene (1904-1991) (The Quiet American, The Third Man) who is buried in Switzerland.
Contemporary writers – such as Alan Bennet, John Le Carré and Tom Stoppard – typically do not qualify for memorials (yet). However, in the case of JK Rowling, the creator of Harry Potter, an exception of sorts can be made. The mythical Platform 9¾ at King’s Cross railway station in London provides a unique tribute to her genius. Never mind that it’s located between platforms 8 and 9 or that Ms Rowling has said she was actually thinking of Euston station!
Non-English writers are included in our list where there’s a relevant connection to England, for example: Roald Dahl (Welsh), JM Barrie, Thomas Carlyle, Daniel Defoe, Arthur Conan Doyle (all Scottish), CS Lewis, George Bernard Shaw, Laurence Sterne, Bram Stoker, Oscar Wilde (all Irish). Also included are two great American-British writers. The novelist Henry James was born in New York City in 1843. After spending much of his life in Europe, he settled in England and became a British subject in 1915. The poet and playwright TS Eliot was born in St Louis, Missouri in 1888. He moved to England at the age of 25 and lived there for the rest of his life, becoming a British subject in 1927.
1 The National Trust takes care of 160 historic houses, 40,000 archaeological sites, 775 miles of coastline, 250,000 hectares of countryside, and even 59 villages. As Bill Bryson says in his marvelous book The Road to Little Dribbling: “The world is unquestionably a better place for having the National Trust in it.” More precisely, per Frank Barrett in his equally marvelous book Treasured Island: “If the rest of the world doesn’t have the range of important literary properties open to the public that we have in the UK, then the answer is that the rest of the world does not have anything like our National Trust.”
2 Poets’ Corner is a special section of the South Transept of Westminster Abbey that’s dedicated to poets, playwrights and writers who are buried and/or commemorated there. The first to be interred in Poets’ Corner was Geoffrey Chaucer. Other major literary figures buried there include Robert Browning, William Congreve, Charles Dickens, John Dryden, Thomas Hardy, Dr Samuel Johnson, Ben Jonson, Rudyard Kipling, John Masefield, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, Edmund Spenser and Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Among those British and Irish writers commemorated but not buried in the Abbey are Matthew Arnold, WH Auden, Jane Austen, John Betjeman, William Blake, the Brontë sisters, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Robert Burns, Lord Byron, Lewis Carroll, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, George Eliot, TS Eliot, Elizabeth Gaskell, Oliver Goldsmith, Thomas Gray, AE Housman, Ted Hughes, Henry James, John Keats, Charles Kingsley, Philip Larkin, DH Lawrence, Edward Lear, CS Lewis, Christopher Marlowe, John Milton, Alexander Pope, John Ruskin, Walter Scott, William Shakespeare, Percy Bysshe Shelley, William Makepeace Thackeray, Dylan Thomas, Anthony Trollope, Oscar Wilde and William Wordsworth. There’s a special memorial to sixteen poets of the First World War including Rupert Brooke, Wilfred Owen, Siegfried Sassoon and Edward Thomas. Elsewhere in the Abbey there are memorials to John Bunyan, Winston Churchill, Noel Coward and Charles Darwin.
3 A blue plaque is installed in a public place to commemorate a link between that place and a famous person or event. The scheme was begun in London in 1867 – with a plaque marking the birthplace of Lord Byron at 24 Holles Street, Cavendish Square, which was subsequently demolished – and it’s now administered by English Heritage. Today there are many hundreds of such plaques across the country. Similar schemes run by local authorities or professional organizations provide plaques in brown, green, red and other colors.