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A day out at the Dickens Museum

9/8/2023

Last week I took the boys up to London to visit the British Museum. After several hours of gawking at artefacts and marvelling at mummified cats, we decided we'd had enough. Although it wasn't nearly as busy as the Natural History Museum or the Science Museum, there were still a lot of people. Once outside, I convinced the boys (read: bribed with souvenir chocolate mummies) to take a 15 minute walk to the Charles Dickens Museum.

Tucked away down a quiet residential street, the museum seemed a world away from touristy London. This charming Victorian terrace was Dickens' home from 1837 to 1839. Here he completed The Pickwick Papers and Oliver Twist and began work on Nicholas Nickelby and Barnaby Rudge. Of course, those titles didn't mean much to my young travel companions, but the boys are big fans of A Christmas Carol (or as it's known in our house: The Muppets' Christmas Carol).

We were delighted to find that we practically had the place to ourselves. There were a few other families, but we were rarely in the same rooms at the same time. The lovely tour guide took us around the ground floor and went out of her way to point out things that would be of interest to children.

Of course, the highlight had to be the study and Dickens' mahogony writing desk, which was moved here from his home in Kent, Gad's Hill Place. I had goosebumps just looking at that weathered writing surface and thinking of all the hours Dickens would have spent at this desk working on Great Expectations and A Tale of Two Cities.

On the third floor, we found the servants quarters and the nursery. We were a bit surprised to find a section of jail bars from the Marshalsea prison here. Dickens’s father was sent to the infamous prison in 1824 for debts to a baker. Young Charles, who was 12 at the time, was forced to give up school and work in a factory. This event would inspire some of his best novels and undoubtedly shaped his own childhood.

After we finished with the house, we came back through the gift shop. Although small, the Curiosity Shop (as they call it) was packed with Dickensian memorabilia and other literary gifts. The boys were a little disappointed with the lack of Muppet tie-in souvenirs. Had there been so much as a Kermit as Bob Crachet bookmark, they would have been the happiest of customers. Instead, they settled for tea and scones from the cafe. As we sat in the quiet courtyard, we wondered if Dickens may have taken his tea in the exact same spot. We decided that he had and that we were very lucky to be sitting there now.

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In search of...Manderley

10/21/2020

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Just as the new Mrs de Winter lives in the shadow of her predecessor, Netflix's new adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca has some big shoes to fill. But there's at least one way this version can outshine the Hitchcock classic and that's the setting. Manderley, Maxim de Winter's sprawling coastal estate, plays an integral role in the novel and here we finally get to see it in all its glory. While the 1940 movie was primarily shot on Hollywood backlots (with a miniature tabletop house), the Netflix film takes us into the heart of the British countryside and to Manderley on a grand scale.

Starring Lily James and Armie Hamer, Rebecca is now streaming on Netflix and although it may not measure up to the original, it's still wonderful to see du Maurier's classic novel brought back to life. Filming took place in the south of France and at several different locations around England. Instead of du Maurier's beloved Cornwall, the producers opted to film the coastal scenes over the border in North Devon at Heartland Quay. With its rough seas and history of shipwrecks, the area's craggy shore lent itself perfectly to the story.

Cranborne Manor as Manderley

Acclaimed production designer, Sarah Greenwood (Atonement, Pride and Prejudice), was tasked with the impossible job of finding a house that matched du Maurier's descriptions of Manderley. In an interview with Dorset Magazine, Greenwood explained that seven stately homes were used in the production, with Cranborne Manor in Dorset taking a starring role as the main exterior of Manderley. The Cranborne estate is owned by the Marquess of Salisbury, whose main seat is Hatfield House in Herefordshire, which was also used as a filming location for several interior scenes, including the climactic costume ball.

Another Dorset estate featured in many of the garden scenes as well as some of those in Manderley's west wing. Mapperton, near Beaminster, is a stunning Jacobean manor house and home to the Earl and Countess of Sandwich. You may recognise the exterior from the 2009 adaptation of Emma, where it appeared as the Weston's Randalls. Or from the 2015 version of Far from the Madding Crowd when it featured as Bathsheba's Everdene Farm.

Scenes in the east wing bedrooms were filmed at Loseley House in Surrey. Three National Trust properties also appeared in the film, including Osterley House near Heathrow (the servants quarters), Ham House in Surrey (Mrs Danvers' room) and Petworth House in West Sussex, where that pivotal moment involving a family portrait was recreated in the sculpture gallery.

The Real MAnderley

The Manderley of Daphne du Maurier's imagination was also a composite based on two real places, Menabilly in Cornwall and Milton Hall in Cambridgeshire. Although Cornwall is never mentioned in the novel, the Hitchcock film has the house set there and the county played an important role in du Maurier's works, including Jamaica Inn and Frenchman's Creek. Born in London in 1907, Daphne du Maurier regularly came to Cornwall on holiday as a child. But it was in 1926, when her family purchased a holiday home at Bodinnick that she really began her lifelong love affair with the county.

Menabilly

During her many visits to Cornwall, du Maurier became obsessed with an abandoned house to the west of Fowey, called Menabilly. Like Manderley, Menabilly was a large secluded estate by the sea with a long, winding drive. Although the grounds were overgrown, du Maurier loved to walk through the thick woods and towering rhododendrons.

The house had belonged to the Rashleigh family since the 16th Century and although it was in a state of disrepair, du Maurier eventually convinced the owners to lease it to her. She moved in with her young family and set about fixing it up herself. They lived there from 1943 to 1967, when the new Rashleigh heir decided to move in. After relinquishing Menabilly, du Maurier rented another house on the estate, Kilmarth, where she lived until her death in 1989.

Milton Hall

Du Maurier said that the interior of Manderley was based on Milton Hall in Cambridgeshire, the home of the Fitzwilliam family. She had visited the house as a child with her mother and her experiences of the daily routines of a big country house would later help her to create the inner workings of Manderley. It was perhaps here that she first experienced the laying of the tea table with a 'snowy cloth' at precisely half past four. Or where she learned that certain rooms were only used at certain times of the day.

Du MAURier's Cornwall

Polridmouth Cove

A Cornish summer can be a heady experience and it's easy to imagine nature taking over here as it does in the end with Manderley. With its rugged coastline and untamed beauty, Cornwall provided the perfect backdrop for Rebecca, but du Maurier didn't actually write the novel while living here. In 1936, she followed her army major husband to Egypt. She saw her time there as a sort of exile and her longing for home and for Cornwall helped to inspire the first pages of the novel.

Although the author's former homes are privately owned, there are two holiday cottages on the Menabilly estate (these are often booked up years in advance!). And there are other du Maurier sites to explore such as Polridmouth Cove, which is known locally as Rebecca Beach and where you can catch a glimpse of the elusive grounds of Menabilly. The charming town of Fowey prides itself on its links to the author and hosts an annual literary festival in her honour. For more information on Daphne du Maurier's life and works visit dumaurier.org.

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Real Places in...Persuasion

10/7/2020

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Somerset

The novel begins at Kellynch Hall, a fictional estate in Somerset(shire) where Anne Elliot lives with her father, Sir Walter, and elder sister, Elizabeth. Although we can't know for sure if Austen based the house on a real place, some think that Barrington Court fits the bill geographically as it is located about 20 miles from Lyme Regis and 50 miles from Bath. Now owned by the National Trust, this impressive Tudor property featured as Cardnal Wolsey's house in the Wolf Hall miniseries.

Lyme Regis

"...the remarkable situation of the town, the principal street almost hurrying into the water, the walk to the Cobb, skirting round the pleasant little bay, which, in the season, is animated with bathing machines and company; the Cobb itself, its old wonders and new improvements, with the very beautiful line of cliffs stretching out to the east of the town, are what the stranger's eye will seek; and a very strange stranger it must be, who does not see charms in the immediate environs of Lyme, to make him wish to know it better." (Persuasion Chapter 11)

Jane Austen visited Lyme Regis in Dorset on two separate occasions in 1803 and 1804 and was instantly taken with it. This pretty coastal village plays a crucial role in the novel. It's here that Anne and Captain Wentworth begin to rekindle their romance and where Louisa Musgrave falls from the Cobb, the iconic harbour wall.

Bath

One of Austen's most Bath-centric novels (along with Northanger Abbey), Persuasion delves into the hierarchy of Regency society in the fashionable spa town. Anne doesn't care for Bath and is reluctant to move there. "She disliked Bath, and did not think it agreed with her; and Bath was to be her home." (Persuasion Chapter 2)

Austen uses many real places in Bath including the The Assembly Rooms (pictured above), the Pump Room and Camden Place (now Camden Crescent). And Austen carefully places her characters' homes according to their social status. (This excellent article on Jasna.org offers an in-depth analysis of Austen's use of Bath geography in Persuasion.) Each location seems to have a deeper meaning. So it's perhaps no coincidence when Anne bumps into Captain Wentworth on Union Street towards the end of the novel.