New Place

Hiding in plain sight
A recent visit to Stratford-upon-Avon revealed a few new angles I’d not fully appreciated before. Shakespeare’s final home, New Place, has in recent years been subjected to extensive archaeological exploration and refashioning for the modern age. Previously you had to enter through Nash’s House (next door) named after the Thomas Nash who married Shakespeare’s grand-daughter, Elizabeth Hall. Now you enter through a beautifully crafted wooden door in the same position as the original gatehouse.

Commuting to London
Germaine Greer’s superb Shakespeare’s Wife produced a brilliant account of the social history of Elizabethan and Jacobean domestic life in the Midlands. One of her central ideas demonstrates how many men in the Midlands would commute to London but live in smaller market towns like Stratford, especially in the winter. 375 years of traditional Shakespearean biographies have claimed that Shakespeare left Stratford for London and never went back until he retired. The evidence suggests otherwise. There is no reason to think Shakespeare was any different to other commuters. He only ever rented temporary lodgings in London.

Roots in Stratford
In his will Shakespeare named 25 beneficiaries. Of those, 21 were connected to his life in Stratford. He bought 107 acres of Stratford land for £302 in 1602 and three years later paid £480 for a share in the Stratford tithes, an annual tax from which he made £60 a year. These are not the actions of someone who didn’t feel he belonged to Warwickshire. Both his daughters married in Stratford and Greer’s biography of Anne Shakespeare (née Hathaway) (and the new archaeology at New Place) persuade me that Anne was a successful brewer and New Place was a thriving and productive hive of (potentially commercial) industry.

New Place
The biggest evidence that Shakespeare belonged to Stratford is of course New Place itself. It was the biggest house in the centre of town, built by the Clopton family in 1483. By the time Shakespeare bought it (for £120 – a schoolmaster’s annual salary was £20), the building had 10 fireplaces and a much greater number of rooms. The latest archaeology has been able to identify the house’s footprint and revealed it had three sides around a courtyard with a freshwater well. Facing the street was the gatehouse side with a long gallery above it; along Chapel Lane was the service block with a kitchen, laundry and brewery; and the main living block, including a Great Hall, angled slightly inwards, protected from the main street and with views over the gardens.

Warm at home, secure and safe
You’d think after at least 30 years of being a Shakespeare fanboy there’d be few surprises left for me. And yet…. if you put two and two together and realise that Shakespeare owned New Place for 19 years of his life (between 1597 and 1616 when he died) and for a good part of the year he lived there, it is inevitable that he would have done some of his writing there. I know this sounds obvious, but the prevailing impression has been that Shakespeare only wrote in garrets in London. Over half Shakespeare’s work was completed during the period he owned New Place. Writers write anywhere and everywhere. It’s inconceivable that his imagination didn’t soar and pour out at New Place.

Up North Again

Everything Old Is New Again
Sometimes when you return somewhere you see things anew, see things you didn’t see before and think things you didn’t think last time. So it was a pleasure to take Harriet to see Chatsworth: House Style on a less crowded day than last time. With the added bonus of a family picnic for Emily’s birthday.

Summer jaunts
Those who know me well know that I’m a fan of pavements and buildings, cityscapes and hygiene. Yes, I love the countryside – walking, enjoying views and smelling fresh air – but I like to walk on designated paths covered in woodchip and not be too far away from the nearest running hot water…. I’m not a typical Yorkshireman in being psychologically allergic to mud. So I even surprised myself by wanting to go to this year’s Great Yorkshire Show where the animals were real and the smells of the animals even more real. And the animals thought nothing of pissing and shitting in front of me. How rude. Of course some of them – like Atkinson’s Action Horses – were dressed up like the film extras they were and well drilled in their theatrical behaviour.

Protect and Survive
Somewhere I’d never been before was the Cold War Bunker near York, now looked after by English Heritage. It brought back memories of the booklet Protect and Survive which households were issued with in the early 1980s. I have strong memories of taking part in a touring T-i-E project at the University of Manchester called Going Up which attempted to make fun of the leaflet. Visiting the Cold War bunker recently it was clear how extensive the preparations were for monitoring nuclear fall-out in the event of an attack or accident. Our perky guide had plenty of startling anecdotes about the Royal Observer Corps who staffed the bunkers and who were only completely decommissioned in 1996.

Bring Me Sunshine
A return visit to Morecambe is always welcome – the vast bay and extensive promenade provides plenty of opportunities to stretch legs and blow away cobwebs. The difference this time is that we visited on a very sunny day unlike previous occasions when the waves crashed onto the footpaths and the views across to the Lake District were obscured by mist.

St Patrick’s Chapel
The walk along from Morecambe to Heysham is always worth doing to visit the atmospheric church of St Peter’s with its graveyard overlooking the bay and its Viking hogback stone. A few more steps take you to the ruins of elevated St Patrick’s Chapel looked after by the National Trust. The enigmatic rock-cut coffin graves are startling.

Nostalgic memories
A new Retirement game is to chase the sun on a day out. So we made the west coast sun in Morecambe and more recently found the east coast sun in Bridlington. Another oft-visited place seen through new eyes at a new stage of life. Bridlington was the “big town” when we spent childhood holidays at nearby Reighton Gap caravan park. Later on I took my own children when they were tiny to build castles on deserted beaches when British seaside towns had, for a time, become unfashionable. Now the beaches are busy again and “staycations” have become more popular. The North beach is quieter than the South beach and walking on the sands by the North Sea is one of the top pleasures in life.