The homes of famous writers have a strange allure. A suggestion of genius in the air, perhaps. In the Telegraph, Claudia FitzHerbert has a beguiling piece on newly-reopened Max Gate (pictured), the house in which Thomas Hardy wrote many
of his most celebrated works.
Having the name of a famous writer in the town hall records is a boon for any local authority. Take a bow Stratford-upon-Avon. The recently refurbished RSC theatre is just the start. The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust looks after a variety of Bard-related real estate including the Henley Street house in which Shakespeare was born, Anne Hathaway’s
cottage and the farm once occupied by Shakespeare’s mother.
My own nod for best writer’s house has to go to Wordsworth’s country retreat, Dove Cottage. The cramped, fidgety
little rooms and dusky lighting make the poet’s paeans to the outdoors seem perfectly logical. Plus, my visit last year happened to coincide with that of a certain Seamus Heaney, a man many might
consider Wordsworth’s present-day heir.
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