Chapter III: Introduction: Literary England

Some knowledge of the homes and haunts of English authors is necessary for an understanding of their work. We feel in much closer touch with Shakespeare after merely reading about Stratford-on-Avon; but we seem to share his experiences when we actually walk from Stratford-on-Avon to Shottery and Warwick. The scenery and life of the Lake Country are reflected in Wordsworth's poetry. Ayr and the surrounding country throw a flood of light on the work of Burns. The streets of London are a commentary on the novels of Dickens. A journey to Canterbury aids us in recreating the life of Chaucer's Pilgrims.

Much may be learned from a study of literary England. Whether one does or does not travel, such study is necessary. Those who hope at some time to visit England should acquire in advance as much knowledge as possible about the literary associations of the places to be visited; for when the opportunity for the trip finally comes, there is usually insufficient time for such preparation as will enable the traveler to derive the greatest enjoyment from a visit to the literary centers in which Great Britain abounds.

Whenever an author is studied, his birthplace should be located on the literary map. Baedeker's _Great Britain_ will be indispensable in making an itinerary. The _Reference List for Literary England_ is sufficiently comprehensive to enable any one to plan an enjoyable literary pilgrimage through Great Britain and to learn the most important facts about the places connected with English authors.

The following suggestions from the author's experience are intended to serve merely as an illustration of how to begin an itinerary. The majority of east-bound steamships call at Plymouth, a good place to disembark for a literary trip. From Plymouth, the traveler may go to Exeter (a quaint old town with a fine cathedral, the home of _Exeter Book_,) thence by rail to Camelford in Cornwall and by coach four miles to the fascinating Tintagel (King Arthur), where, as Tennyson says in his _Idylls of the King_:--

"All down the thundering shores of Bude and Bos,
There came a day as still as heaven, and then
They found a naked child upon the sands
Of dark Tintagil by the Cornish sea,
And that was Arthur."

Next, the traveler may go by coach to Bude (of which Tennyson remarked, "I hear that there are larger waves at Bude than at any other place. I must go thither and be alone with God") and to unique Clovelly and Bideford (Kingsley), by rail to Ilfracombe, by coach to Lynton (Lorna Doone), and the adjacent Lynmouth (where Shelley passed some of his happiest days and alarmed the authorities by setting afloat bottles containing his _Declaration of Rights_), by coach to Minehead, by rail to Watchet, driving past Alfoxden (Wordsworth) to Nether-Stowey (Coleridge) and the Quantock Hills, by motor and rail to Glastonbury (Isle of Avalon, burial place of King Arthur and Queen Guinevere), by rail to Wells (cathedral), to Bath (many literary associations), to Bristol (Chatterton, Southey), to Gloucester (fine cathedral, tomb of Edward II), and to Ross, the starting point for a remarkable all day's row down the river Wye to Tintern Abbey (Wordsworth), stopping for dinner at Monmouth (Geoffrey of Monmouth).

After a start similar to the foregoing, the traveler should begin to make an itinerary of his own. He will enjoy a trip more if he has a share in planning it. From Tintern Abbey he might proceed, for instance, to Stratford-on-Avon (Shakespeare); then to Warwick, Kenilworth, and the George Eliot Country in North Warwickshire and Staffordshire.

Far natural beauty, there is nothing in England that is more delightful than a coaching trip through Wordsworth's Lake Country (Cumberland and Westmoreland). From there it is not far to the Carlyle Country (Ecclefechan, Craigenputtock), to the Burns Country (Dumfries, Ayr), and to the Scott Country (Loch Katrine, The Trossachs, Edinburgh, and Abbotsford). In Edinburgh, William Sharp's statement about Stevenson should be remembered, "One can, in a word, outline Stevenson's own country as all the region that on a clear day one may in the heart of Edinburgh descry from the Castle walls."

If the traveler lands at Southampton, he is on the eastern edge of Thomas Hardy's Wessex, Dorchester in Dorsetshire being the center. The Jane Austen Country (Steventon, Chawton) is in Hampshire. To the east, in Surrey, is Burford Bridge near Dorking, where Keats wrote part of his _Endymion_, where George Meredith had his summer home, and where "the country of his poetry" is located.

In London, it is a pleasure to trace some of the greatest literary associations in the world. We may stand at the corner of Monkwell and Silver streets, on the site of a building in which Shakespeare wrote some of his greatest plays. Milton lived in the vicinity and is buried not far distant in St. Giles Church. In Westminster Abbey we find the graves of many of the greatest authors, from Chaucer to Tennyson. London is not only Dickens Land and Thackeray Land, but also the "Land" of many other writers. We may still eat in the Old Cheshire Cheese, where Johnson and Goldsmith dined.

Those interested in literary England ought to include the cathedral towns in their itinerary, so that they may visit the wonderful "poems in stone," some of which, _e.g_., Canterbury (Chaucer), Winchester (Izaak Walton, Jane Austen), Lichfield (Johnson), have literary associations. For this reason, all of the cathedral towns in England have been included in the literary map.

REFERENCE LIST FOR LITERARY ENGLAND:

Baedeker's _Great Britain_ (includes England and Scotland).

Baedeker's _London and its Environs_.

Adcock's _Famous Houses and Literary Shrines of London_.

Lang's _Literary London_.

Hutton's _Literary Landmarks in London_.

Lucas's _A Wanderer in London_.

Shelley's _Literary By-Paths in Old England_.

Baildon's _Homes and Haunts of Famous Authors_.

Bates's _From Gretna Green to Land's End_.

Masson's _In the Footsteps of the Poets_.

Wolfe's _A Literary Pilgrimage among the Haunts of Famous British Authors_.

Salmon's _Literary Rambles in the West of England_.

Hutton's _A Book of the Wye_.

Headlam's _Oxford (Medieval Towns Series)_.

Winter's _Shakespeare's England_.

Murray's _Handbook of Warwickshire_.

Lee's _Stratford-on-Avon, from the Earliest Times to the Death of Shakespeare_.

Tompkins's _Stratford-on-Avon_ (Dent's _Temple Topographies_).

Brassington's _Shakespeare's Homeland_.

Winter's _Grey Days and Gold_ (Shakespeare).

Collingwood's _The Lake Counties_ (Dent's County Guides).

Wordsworth's _The Prelude_ (Books I.-V.).

Rawnsley's _Literary Associations of the English Lakes_.

Knight's _Through the Wordsworth Country_.

Bradley's _Highways and Byways in the English Lakes_.

Jerrold's _Surrey_ (Dent's County Guides).

Dewar's _Hampshire with Isle of Wight_ (Dent's County Guides).

Ward's _The Canterbury Pilgrimage_.

Harper's _The Hardy Country_.

Snell's _The Blackmore Country_.

Melville's _The Thackeray Country_.

Kitton's _The Dickens Country_.

Sloan's _The Carlyle Country_.

Dougall's _The Burns Country_.

Crockett's _The Scott Country_.

Hill's _Jane Austen: Her Homes and Her Friends_.

Cook's _Homes and Haunts of John Ruskin_.

William Sharp's _Literary Geography and Travel Sketches_ (Vol. IV. of _Works_) contains chapters on _The Country of Stevenson, The Country of George Meredith, The Country of Carlyle, The Country of George.

Eliot, The Brontë Country, Thackeray Land_, The Thames from Oxford to the Nore_.

Hutton's _Literary Landmarks of Edinburgh_.

Stevenson's _Picturesque Notes on Edinburgh_.

Loftie's _Brief Account of Westminster Abbey_.

Parker's _Introduction to the Study of Gothic Architecture_.

Stanley's _Memorials of Westminster Abbey_.

Kimball's _An English Cathedral Journey_.

Singleton's _How to Visit the English Cathedrals_.

Bond's _The English Cathedrals_ (200 illustrations).

Cram's _The Ruined Abbeys of Great Britain_ (6 illustrations).

Home's _What to See in England_.

Boynton's _London in English Literature_.

GENERAL REFERENCE LIST FOR THE STUDY OF ENGLISH LITERATURE[1]:

_Cambridge History of English Literature_, 14 vols.

Garnett and Gosse's _English Literature_, 4 vols.

Morley's _English Writers_, 11 vols.

Jusserand's _Literary History of the English People_.

Taine's _English Literature_.

Courthope's _History of English Poetry_, 6 vols.

Stephens and Lee's _Dictionary of National Biography_ (dead authors).

_New International Cyclopedia_ (living and dead authors).

_English Men of Letters Series_ (abbreviated reference, E.M.L.)

_Great Writers' Series_ (abbreviated reference. G.W.).

Poole's _Index_ (and continuation volumes for reference to critical articles in periodicals).

_The United States Catalogue_ and _Cumulative Book Index_.

SELECTIONS FROM ENGLISH LITERATURE[2]:

*Pancoast and Spaeth's _Early English Poems_. (P. & S.)[3]

*Warren's _Treasury of English Literature, Part I_. (Origins to Eleventh Century: London, One Shilling.) (Warren.)

*Ward's _English Poets_, 4 vols. (Ward.)

*Bronson's _English Poems_, 4 vols. (Bronson.)

_Oxford Treasury of English Literature_, Vol. I., _Beowulf to Jacobean_;

*Vol. II., _Growth of the Drama_; Vol. III., _Jacobean to Victorian_.
(Oxford Treasury.)

*_Oxford Book of English Verse_. (Oxford.)

*Craik's _English Prose_, 5 vols. (Craik.)

*Page's _British Poets of the Nineteenth Century_. (Page.)

Chambers's _Cyclopedia of English Literature_. (Chambers.)

Manly's _English Poetry_ (from 1170). (Manly I.)

Manly's _English Prose_ (from 1137). (Manly II.)

_Century Readings for a Course in English Literature_. (Century.)