-
‘Swing, tramp, and trudge’
Across London in the footsteps of Mrs Dalloway. “‘I love walking in London’ said Mrs Dalloway.” And so do I. An urban walk can be packed with interest. And in London this is particularly the case; you can barely move for wedding-cake churches, obscure Victorians in togas, alleyways with fanciful names, commemorative plaques and a…
-
A curious contrast
A coastal walk through the landscape that inspired Rebecca. I have always been intrigued by the notion that the two wildly different Mrs de Winters in Rebecca are just two sides of author Daphne du Maurier’s own personality. Though the two women approach life very differently, their fates are ultimately similar. And I find myself…
-
Autumn imagination
Beech woods and a windmill inspired by Lolly Willowes. Planning this walk gave me the excuse (not that I need one) to spend a lot of time looking at maps. Lolly Willowes (Sylvia Townsend Warner) tells the story of a woman who, on reaching middle age, leaves behind her safe and dull life in 1930s…
-
‘Over the hills and far away’
To the county boundary with Pigling Bland. The first, and for a long time the only, Beatrix Potter book I owned was The Tale of Pigling Bland. I chose it from a shop somewhere in the Lake District while on holiday as a child. I can’t recall why I selected this particular tale, but I’m…
-
‘Colour and distance and depth’
Above the tunnels and caves of The Underground Man. I first came across the fifth Duke of Portland in Bill Bryson’s Notes from a Small Island. As part of Bryson’s valedictory tour of Britain he walks from Worksop to the family seat of the Dukes of Portland at Welbeck Abbey.
-
‘…so vast, so barren, and so mysterious’
An atmospheric walk across the Dartmoor of The Hound of the Baskervilles. I love Dartmoor. It’s not somewhere I have walked a lot, but I have always enjoyed the contrast of wild moorland that is everywhere dotted with remnants of human influence. Stone crosses, abandoned tin mines, beautifully constructed leats and ruins of ancient habitations…
-
‘The country of my heart’
A ramble through the countryside of D H Lawrence. For reasons I don’t quite recall now, in my application to study comparative literature at university I wrote that I had read D H Lawrence. I hadn’t. But he was on my list.
-
‘The warmth of exercise’
A short walk from Lyme Hall inspired by Pride and Prejudice. It is a truth universally acknowledged that any piece of writing about Pride and Prejudice has to riff on the famous opening line at least once. When I had the idea for a blog about fiction-inspired walks, Lizzie Bennet immediately sprung to mind as…
-
Subscribe
Subscribed
Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
A Reader's Rambles 