February Newsletter

Are you planning a romantic break to Britain for St Valentines Day?

why not get ‘Far from the Madding Crowd’ and visit the landscapes that have inspired some of the great romantic tales of British literature.

Thomas Hardy, Jane Austin, the Brontes, Wordsworth and Sir Walter Scott - the writers of some of Britain’s classic romances have encapsulated their surroundings in their writings to provide memorable backdrops that have captivated readers for decades.

But you don’t have to be a literary or even literate to enjoy the peace and quiet, alone with a loved one in romantic sweeping valleys, quaint rural villages or elegant Georgian towns across Britain. The literary connections simply add to the romantic interest and lend an air of respectability to your rendez-vous.

If you do want to get Far From the Madding Crowd, you might want to try Dorchester, hometown of author Thomas Hardy. Hardy set this and his other famous novel Tess of the D’Urbervilles in the semi fictional county of Wessex, a medieval Anglo Saxon county that ceased to exist after the Norman Conquest. The real locations for both these tales of the love lives of his enigmatic heroines are centred around the rural south west of England in Dorset, Devon, Wiltshire and Somerset. Here you’ll find a gentle rolling landscape, dotted with honey coloured villages and thatched cottages, while the Dorset and Devon coast is renowned as the English Riviera, home to golden sandy beaches and small fishing villages. Dorchester plays an integral part in Hardy’s novels, under the name of Castlebridge, and the Dorset County Museum in the town contains Hardy memorabilia including the writer’s study while Max Gate, his home and a small thatched cottage where he was born all form part of the Hardy Trail in and around Dorchester.

From the sunny south coast to the north of England windswept moors of Bronte Country. The sisters Charlotte, Emily and Anne Bronte lived in the Yorkshire town of Haworth, high in the Pennine Moors. The wild and brooding winds inspired the title of Wuthering Heights and many of the book’s supernatural elements can be attributed to the cold and windy nights on the moors. Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre & Agnes Grey were written in the Bronte Parsonage in Haworth, where Emily, Anne & Charlotte lived with their father, a local clergyman. Though educated and far better off than others in Haworth during the industrial revolution, the Brontes were still poor and Emily, Anne and Charlotte had to work as governesses for rich families in the area, allowing them a fly on the wall existence that would later inform their writings about the trails and tribulations of the landed classes.

The Bronte Parsonage is now an award-winning museum, with various exhibitions on the writings and lives of the Brontes. Visiting the home in which these three remarkable women spent most of their lives provides a fascinating insight into the freedoms and restrictions of the time in which they lived and a deeper understanding of their novels.

In the surrounding South Pennine Moors fans of the Brontes will find a number of recognizable features such as the ruined farm at Top Withins along a walking route called the Bronte Way.

While the Brontes wrote about the lives and loves of the landed gentry in the north, their contemporary Jane Austin (albeit proceeding the Brontes by a number of decades), focused on the intricate sexual politics of high society in the esteemed modern town of Bath.

Jane Austin, like the Bronte’s was the educated daughter of a clergyman and in 1801 her family moved to fashionable Bath at the height of the town’s grandeur. It was at No. 4 Sydney Place in the elegant Georgian spa town that Austin wrote her two most famous novels; Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility. Bath’s gracious Georgian crescents have provided the backdrop to numerous period costume adaptations and thousands of Jane Austin devotees pay homage to Bath each year, visiting the Jane Austin centre with exhibitions on period costumes and items relating to the author’s life. However despite the glamour and elegance of Bath, Austin never really enjoyed living there and later moved to Winchester, where she died at the age of 41 and is buried in Winchester Cathedral.

One writer, who in contrast was deeply in love with his surroundings was William Wordsworth. And how could he not be when the object of his undying affections was the Lake District. Indeed Wordsworth was so in love with the lakes that he helped launch the Romantic Age of English literature that was to influence the likes of Jane Austin, the Brontes and Hardy. England’s poet laureate, Wordsworth was born in Cockermouth and later lived with his sister Dorothy at Dove Cottage in Grasmere in the heart of the Lake District.

Wordsworth’s poetry encapsulated the beguiling atmospheric beauty and breathtaking scenery of the Lake District that each year attracts millions of visitors hoping to feel similarly inspired. Many head to Dove Cottage where the interior has been keep as it was during Wordsworth’s residence and includes exhibitions on the life and works of the writer, and to nearby Rydal Mount where he later lived. But to fully appreciate Wordsworth is to get out to the landscapes that inspired the great romantic, places like Derwent Water, Hawkshead and the Old Man of Coniston where you’ll feel romantically inspired yourselves.

Another writer of the era whose work encapsulated his surroundings was Sir Walter Scott. Born in the Old Town of Edinburgh in 1711, Scott wrote the famous historic novels Rob Roy, Ivanhoe and the Lady of the Lake. His tales mixing local folklore with atmospheric scenery, helped create a renaissance in Scottish culture at a time when Scotland was suffering the woes of the highland clearances and Scots were leaving for the new world in their droves.

Scott’s younger years were spent in the Scottish Borders on his grandparents’ farm at Sandyknowe, close to his ancestral home of Smailholm Tower which today houses an exhibition on the writer. At Sandyknowe, Scott was taught the many tales of Scottish folklore that would later inspire his own stories, but for scenery, Scott chose Loch Lomond and the Trossachs. The sweeping lake filled valleys and deep wooded fells that typify the Trossachs provided the inspiration and backdrop for his best sellers, the Lady of Lake and Rob Roy.

Scott’s stories were immensely popular and their readers became enamored with the Scottish Highlands. These included King George IV who asked the writer to organize his visit to Scotland in 1822, a pivotal event that lead to a fashion in all things tartan and Scottish. In his later years Scott took up the post of Sheriff of Selkirk and the quaint borders town houses Scott’s Courtroom, detailing his career as Sheriff.

Inspiring scenes and landscapes can be found throughout Britain and maybe a visit this St Valentine’s Day can inspire you to come up with a romantic tale all of your own.

myguideBritain can help build your perfect romantic vacation whatever the occasion, for further information enquire now.