We have a fascination with writers who draw from place. It is probably something to do with the fact that as walkers we are out carving our way through space and experiencing places, one step at a time. We are not great writers so appreciate those who can write a good story and engage with readers.
We wanted to read more writing from such writers and create experiences on foot, to which we could invite others to discover that writing, as well as exploring places. In addition, we wanted to generate discussion about the writer and their creative process too.
So we can be walking with others, sharing stories from engaging writers, we have devised “Walking: Between the Lines”, and we hope you will come and join us – choosing to read the writing that we are reading too – a Book Club on foot.
Part discovery of engaging writing, part discovery of place, and part discovery of the writer.
We are starting out on this new adventure in November 2018, running an event as often as we can.
A Peckham Spark (Nov 2018)
As it is the centenary of the birth of Dame Muriel Spark, we though it was only right that we should invite you on an adventure to discover Peckham in the 1950s – the setting for her novel “The Ballad of Peckham Rye“.
There is so much more to this slim volume. William Boyd wrote in the introduction to the Penguin Modern Classic edition “ Remember the title here – The Ballad of Peckham Rye – designed to conjure up all the bawdy and scurrilous traditions of the balled form….. a catalogue of sexual crimes and misdemeanours, minor and major – suspicion, jealousy, envy, betrayal, adultery, rupture, violence and, ultimately, murder.”
Written when Muriel Spark was living in nearby Camberwell, it was published a year before “The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie” – by far her most famous novel, because of the play starring Vanessa Redgrave, and the film starring Maggie Smith. Muriel Spark led quite a colourful life herself, living in Africa during the Second World War, abandoning her son in leaving a troubled marriage, she was ‘discovered’ by winning a short story competition. What followed was a string of slim novels, far from lightweight however, many drawing on her life experiences and the places she lived. Latterly she lived with a female companion in New York and then Italy.
The Centenary is marked by a slew of events, many of which have already passed, but there’s a fabulous website, MurielSpark100 listing on-line resources worth a dip into.
Come and join us, in the company of Dame Muriel Spark as we reveal Peckham in the 1950s from 2.30pm-4.30pm on Sunday 4 November remember to read “The Ballad of Peckham Rye” beforehand!
We are open to suggestions on writing and writers who draw from place, so if there is hero or heroine of your’s with whom you would like to go Walking: Between the Lines
We took to the streets of Peckham on Sunday to celebrate the life of Dame Muriel Spark and in particular her novel “The Ballad of Peckham Rye”. We had a great turnout of more than 20 people people, good number of whom had actually read the book!
We began by walking up Rye Lane to the Peckham Arch, standing opposite Jones & Higgins, the once grand Department store to which many hundreds of customers visited on a daily basis In the 1950s, the decade in which the novel is set, and when Muriel Spark was a nearby resident in Camberwell.
Along the route there, we were able to point out buildings that once housed well-known shops including C&A, British Home Stores and Sainsbury’s. For some participants this was the highpoint but there is a lot more to come. Museum co-creator Nigel Bristow film director and tutor in film at Goldsmiths gave us a synopsis to the novel. We then split into pairs to discuss the novel as we retraced our steps in search of locations mentioned in the novel.
We choose the Bussey building as a surrogate for Meadows Meade & Grimley, the first textile factory to employ Dougal Douglas, the novel’s key character. Here co-creator Tim Ingram Smith, adopting a typical Dougal pose, putting a scarf beneath his coat to raise his right shoulder to emphasise Dougals deformity, read from the book.
We continued onto the site of the prefabs on Costa Street. Delightfully Mavis Pilbeam and her sister Elsie described the area as it was when their mother was brought up here as a child. Very recently, the last remaining prefab was sold for close to £1 million. One of those rare serendipity moments occurred when participant, Gail Astbury (Tim Ingram-Smith‘s partner) revealed that she had worked with local schools and artist Tom Phillips to create artwork in the small park behind the site of the prefabs. So we went into the park and Tim read a second passage from the book.
As twilight began, we moved onto Peckham Rye itself, to a point just beyond where the Peckham Lido used to be. “Dougal peers into the gloom across the Rye” In the novel, the Rye is where fights take place, picnics are to be had in the Old English Garden and would-be lovers court. Turning around, we lent on the railings to look over at The Rye Hotel (as it was called by Muriel Spark) . The group shot, shows a great bunch of enthusiasts thoroughly enjoying discovering not only the novel, something of the life of Muriel Spark, but also what Peckham may have been like in the 1950s.
Next month we went to Kensington to walk Between the Lines of two other Muriel Spark novels: “A Far cry from Kensington” and “Loitering with Intent“.
Sparks Fly in Kensington (Dec 2018)
As we try to unravel fact from fiction, whether it is the novels she wrote or her autobiography, Dame Muriel Spark led us on an obscure trail in Kensington. Once well established as a literary author, in the 1980s she wrote two novels, “A Far Cry from Kensington” and “Loitering with Intent” – on reflection set in Kensington in the 1950s both of which drew heavily on her own experiences in trying to have her first literary success and in working for publishers who were less than authentic themselves.
Joined by a group of enthusiasts, our latest “Between the Lines” adventure, began at the Pelham Street entrance of South Kensington tube station. We wandered through ‘pucker Kensington’ little changed from the times when Muriel lived not far away, she either in digs with inconsistent landladies or cohabiting with friends. The 1950s were a period of transition, not least for the country as a whole as it looked back on the war and gave up rationing, but also for Muriel Spark, as she converted from lapsed Jew, via Anglo-catholic, to a Roman Catholic in just a handful of years.
On our walk, we visited key centres of faith that offered guidance and support to Muriel Spark, as well as those that appeared as key locations in her ‘Kensington novels’. Participant, Chris Amies has generously shared his photographs from the walk, and these include, a shot of Brompton Oratory where Wanda, a Polish seamstress who is blackmailed in “Loitering with Intent” regularly attends Sunday services. The Oratory stands in front of the Roman Catholic parish church where Muriel herself worshipped.
We went in search of various addresses at which Muriel Spark lived and worked, as well as the Brompton Hotel at which she entertained ‘acquaintances for drinks’ so that they should never see the squalor in which she had to live. One such address is now highly fashionable, Queensgate Terrace, where a one bedroomed apartment (much like that that Muriel rented for a less than 10 shillings a week) is on sale for £1.495 million! Our route took us as far as the churchyard of St Mary Abbots, just off Kensington High Street, where Muriel lived on the benefit of the parish priest, and where both the opening and closing of “Loitering with Intent” takes place.
The subsequent biography by Martin Stannard reveals that at this very same spot, Muriel Spark made out with her one time lover and fellow literary critic David Sandford, who is mocked mercilessly as a ‘pisseur de copie‘ in “A Far Cry to Kensington”.
So where next for “Between the Lines” our nascent walking reading club? We think that cold January weather is just the setting for an investigation into the whereabouts of J G Ballard‘s “Concrete Island” – somewhere beneath the Westway! We will be announcing a mid- January date shortly and we hope you will join us.
We would love to hear your suggestions for authors with books published since 1945 that draw heavily on particular neighbourhoods. Participants have so far suggested, Tracey Chevalier’s ‘Fallen Angels‘ (set in Highgate Cemetery), Robert Rankin’s, ‘Brentford Triangle‘, and Michael Moorcock’s ‘Mother London‘.
Ballard under the Westway (Jan 2019)
Ten years since the death of author of J G Ballard and we are setting out to discover what lies beneath the Westway, inspiration for his novel “Concrete Island” in which like Robinson Crusoe, the anti-hero of the novel finds himself stranded. Careering off the motorway, through a crash barrier, down an embankment, he miraculously escapes almost unscathed form the wreckage of his Jaguar. His efforts to flag down passing motorists however, cause him considerable distress and injury. We feel for his struggle to make his presence known to others, but like him before them, the passing traffic is unaware of what lies beneath the Westway.
In J G Ballard’s own words ”The day-dream of being marooned on a desert island still has enormous appeal… Robinson Crusoe was one of the first books we read as children, and the fantasy endures.” But what of a solitary forgotten existence – what fears, of hunger, of isolation, of painful slow death might impinge on that dream?
“The Pacific atoll may not be available, but their are other islands nearer to home, some of them only a few steps from the pavements we tread everyday.”
Daniel Defoe‘s “Robinson Crusoe“, upon which Ballard’s ‘Concrete Island‘ is loosely based, was published in 1719 – so we will be paying homage to the original story as well as to Ballard’s near future one.
What participants told us about “Ballard under the Westway“:
What I like best about the event | What I found surprising | How much I enjoyed it (out of 5) and why?
- Going somewhere totally new and unexpected | It was excellent | 5 stars
- Knowledge of guide about the area & guest who knew Ballard | The unfinished motorway | 4 stars
- Readings, & interesting photos and presentation | Mix of usage and social history of the Westway | 5 stars | Very relevant to my interests and good chance to see areas I wouldn’t usually visit
Robert Rankin’s Brentford Triangle (Mar 2019)
Maybe not as exotic as the Bermuda Triangle, but as bewildering, Robert Rankin’s fiction conjures up a decidedly dodgy triangle in riverside Brentford, west London.
In the days when you could get change from a £1 for 3 pints of ‘Large’ and a packet of crisps, mysterious out-of-this-world things kept cropping up in the local allotments and nearby parks and streets. Inebriated investigators, Jim Pooley and Jon Omally, join a cast of oddball characters, neighbours and shopkeepers, to encounter fearsome alien and satanic forces, and rescue Brentford (and the rest of the world) from annihilation.
We do know that Robert Rankin was writer-in-residence at the Waterman’s Arts Centre in the 1980s but like his ‘far-fetched fiction’, biographical notes about the author are whimsical, although it is clear he has an intimate knowledge of Brentford, its ‘watering holes’ and the local characters who frequented the area at the time.
Author of The Brentford Trilogy that ran to several more than three novels, his ability to weave engaging and witty narrative around suburban neighbourhoods is rarely matched.
Join our topographic walking readers group: Between the Lines: part discovery of engaging writing, part discovery of place, and part discovery of the writers. We invite you to read a book or two by Robert Rankin and join us to walk “Between the Lines”.
Robert Rankin’s The Brentford Triangle was a suggestion from Chris Amies, one of our walking reading group.
Please try to read a couple of the novels before you come – our walkshop will focus on The Antipope, The Brentford Triangle and East of Ealing – these titles are available through the author’s own press and in libraries.
Penelope Fitzgerald – Chelsea Castaway (Mar 2019)
Author Penelope Fitzgerald only became a writer in her 50s and went on to prove how successful one can be in later life, picking up many awards including the Booker Prize in 1979. We have chosen ‘Offshore‘, her Booker winning novel for or our latest Between the Lines walking book club read and walkshop. Set in the early 1960s, it draws on Penelope Fitzgerald’s own experience of living in poverty on a houseboat on the river Thames.
There is a cast of bohemian characters whose lives have ebbed and flowed; the rise and fall of the river Thames is a metaphor, for lives ill-spent and unfulfilled; as Fitzgerald wrote a ‘sodden, melancholy, and yet enduring spirit of the Reach’. The houseboat named ‘Grace’ is a central element of the novel as is the Thames, they are almost characters in themselves.
Penelope Fitzgerald moved into a houseboat named ‘ Grace’ in the early 1960s, after her husband was debarred from the law for theft, and their meagre savings dwindled. They lived on the houseboat for two or three years before it sank, taking with it most of their possessions. The stretches of the Thames where the novel is set and where her houseboat was moored are far more chichi than they were in the 1960s, although one is under threat by developers who want to remove the moorings for further gentrification.
40 years ago the Booker winner was thought to be a foregone conclusion, so much so that journalists had already ‘filed’ their stories at to why V. S. Naipaul’s novel ‘The Bend in the River‘ was a such a worthy winner. That at the last moment, the judges chose ‘Offshore’ as the winner, meant that Penelope Fitzgerald’s novel was harshly criticised and she came in for considerable unsavoury press attention.
Her own life story makes heady reading, not least her relationship with her estranged husband, the uproar after the Booker, and for coming later to writing literary fiction. The novel is long on description and light on action, but that’s to our benefit as we will explore the environs in which she lived and those of her novel’s characters. It is a slim novel of less than 150 pages, tightly written, so pick up a copy from your local library or purchase one from a bookseller and join us revealing Penelope Fitzgerald and ‘Offshore‘ as a Chelsea Castaway.
Please be aware that British Summer Time kicks in the night before, so you will need to get up earlier! The walkshop route is linear – we start at Clapham Junction railway station (Grant Road exit by Platforms 1 & 2), weaving our way through Battersea to the riverside, walk downriver past St Mary’s Church, Battersea, cross Battersea Bridge and turn up river towards the Lots Road power station, ending at World’s End (the western end of the King’s Road) – which is served by buses.
Fallen Angel at the Highgate Festival (Jun 2019)
Continuing our Between the Lines walking reader’s book club we seek out a Fallen Angel as part of this year’s Highgate Festival, with a walk that includes a private tour of the West Highgate Cemetery.
As we read between the lines of the novel “Falling Angels” by Tracy Chevalier, we are led on an intriguing route that takes us past Parliament Fields, through the neighbourhood in-between Hampstead and Highgate, climbing the hill to the West Highgate Cemetery. We are following in the footsteps of Lavinia and Maude, two young girls who meet on the day after Queen Victoria dies; their respective families joining in national mourning for the monarch, stroll to the cemetery where are their respective reserved family plots, that happen to be adjacent to each other. An unlikely but beguiling friendship develops between the two girls as they explore the cemetery together during their holidays.
Highgate resident and bestselling author, Tracy Chevalier has been described as “an astute observer of a social era, especially in her portrayal of the lingering sentimentality, prejudices and early stirrings of social change of the Victorian age”. “Falling Angels” was her follow up novel to the international bestseller and film blockbuster “Girl with a Pearl Earring”.
Tracy Chevalier has kindly contributed in the development of the route, and has signed souvenir copies of a “Highgate Cemetery: Windows on the Past” which tells the story of the Highgate cemetery. There will be a copy for each participant.
Please bring suitable clothing and footwear (we will be walking on rough ground and grassed areas). We recommend a bottle of water, hat and sun cream – we are assured the sun will shine – and a light jacket of pullover as it may become chilly).
We want to thank Highgate Cemetery for laying on a special private tour of the West cemetery.
Cider with Rosie revisited (Nov 2019)
Continuing our Between the Lines walking reader’s book club we revisit Cider with Rosie, Laurie Lee’s seminal autobiographical novel that was published 60 years ago in 1959 with a walk that includes a opportunities for participants to create their own souvenir illustrations for the book.
We are led by Kel Portman, on an intriguing route that takes us through the village of Slad in Gloucestershire, where Laurie Lee was brought up in the 1920s. The village then was rarely visited, like many Gloucestershire villages, it’s remoteness enhanced by its steep valley sides. Lee was one of eight children brought up in poverty by his single mother, who lived in futile hope that she would be reunited with her husband.
In Cider with Rosie we read the words of a a lyrical poet, and expert story teller whose vivid and evocative writing brings the village, his childhood home and the local school, and the natural environs to life. Remarkably, the landscape that inspired his work remains largely intact as does his childhood home, church, school and Woolpack Inn.
Safeguarded by the Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust and through designation as an historic landscape, this part of the Cotswolds remains idyllic. The centenary of Laurie Lee’s birth some five years ago brought further acclaim to the author and international interest to this part of the country.
Millions of copies of ‘Cider with Rosie’ have been sold, and since its publication it has probably become his best-loved work. It was dramatised by the BBC in 1971 and became a recommended read for many studying English literature at school in the 1970s and 80s.
What you need to know
Participants are advised to bring their own packed lunch, as although we will be calling at the Woolpack Inn, it is somewhat erratic in its lunch provision.
We are offering two start points – for those who would like to spend longer in the Cotswolds, we will be starting from Stroud station at 11.00am. For those who want to make their way to Slad by other means than by foot, we suggest a 12 Noon start from a point on our route. We are currently negotiating places to park cars. So when you book, please indicate if you are happy to to take the longer route by foot, by selecting the appropriate ticket.
If travelling from London by train – recommend that you take the 0900 from Paddington that arrives after a change at Swindon at 10.43 – the start of the walk is within 2 miles (we will be arranging a shared taxi).
Stella Duffy Lost in Loughbrough Junction (Dec 2019)
Set in a neighbourhood that was created by the criss-crossing of railway lines created by rival companies, Stella Duffy‘s novel “The Room of Lost Things” is a wonderful atmospheric evocation of place, worthy of being explored in our next Between the Lines reading walking book club.
It is as much a love story as a social critique of multi-cultural London. The story of Robert Sutton, the owner of a well-established dry cleaners in Loughborough Junction, that has witnessed the comes and goings of the local residents, and has built up a secret knowledge of their lives and livelihoods.
Ever wondered what happens to things left behind in the pockets of items taken to the dry cleaners? Well Robert Sutton knows only too well.
Duffy brilliantly portrays this hermit-like figure as he comes to sell his dry cleaners to Akeel, a budding entrepreneurial British muslim 20 something year-old from east London. The clash in cultures, aspirations and expectations are deftly revealed as the hide-away of unclaimed items is slowly exposed.
Stella Duffy Tweets: “I LOVE the idea of this. #TheRoomofLostThings is a favourite of my own books and it’s rooted in #loughboroughjunction people & place, now & then. And male friendship. It’s a book of male friendship.”
Ali Smith wrote that “Stella Duffy is a writer who never lets you down, and this is her most ambitious, satisfying book yet.” Similarly Isobel Montgommery in The Guardian described the novel as “satisfyingly mesmerising.”
The walkshop route is linear – we start at Brixton tube station (Victoria Line) (Brixton Road), weaving our way along Coldharbour Lane towards Loughborough Junction and beyond to Ruskin Park, to return to finish at Loughborough Junction station (Thameslink)
Graham Green’s Clapham – the End of the Affair (Feb 2020)
Join us to explore together a wintry and sinister novel in our next Between the Lines reading walking book club.
Written soon after the Second World War, Graham Greene‘s short novel The End of the Affair is set a few years earlier. Bendrix, the narrator is a professional writer and published author, known by his last name, begins an affair with the wife of a civil servant during the London Blitz as part of his research for a novel. Ended by Sarah without explanation, a chance meeting two years later, rekindles his lost love and burgeoning jealousy. His obsessive pursuit of her is set in and around Clapham Common: he living on the south side and Sarah and her husband Henry on the north side.
‘One of the most true and moving novels of my time, in anybody’s language‘ William Faulkner
The End of the Affair may at first glance appear a slight novel, yet it draws the reader rapidly into moral rights and wrongs which endure today, with issues around fascination and stalking. The novel is often described as one of his great Catholic novels, Greene having converted to Catholicism soon after coming down from Oxford when he met his future wife Vivien.
William Golding described Graham Greene as “the ultimate chronicler of twenties century man’s consciousness and anxiety.”
