Two of the best known writers throughout history: Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Agatha Christie.
I got to walk around their houses today. I’ve never felt something like that before, to be in a room where I know Coleridge wrote some of his most famous poetry (Frost at Midnight being one of them), to actually walk across the same few rooms that Agatha Christie once shared memories with her family in, it was truly inspirational, motivational and grounding to take in. I felt so humble.
Purely by being there, I feel like our paths have crossed, even if it is from beyond the grave, so to speak.
Coleridge’s Cottage
I first decided I wanted to go to Coleridge’s house earlier this year when studying one of his poems for an essay. To know that he looked to nature for writerly freedom and inspiration really struck a chord with me back in January and, seeing where he lived today, in a quaint little cottage with his wife and two children, well that struck a chord even harder.
Living in Cornwall, you don’t really get away from nature at all and, from growing up here, it’s kind of hard to put down, or get away from. People tend to come to Cornwall to escape their everyday lives, the hustle bustle and the whirring drone of the everyday. But I’m fortunate enough to see it every morning, noon and night time from my own home.
I can almost see the sea from my bedroom window and I get to pass adorable little sailing boats on a shining, dazzly river whenever I walk into town. The views from pretty much anywhere are amazing, and this is one of the reasons why I love it here so much.
Now, although Coleridge’s cottage that I visited today wasn’t in Cornwall at all, I still love that he chose to write and live for a time in the countryside, that he found it so important.
I got to visit his garden, the kitchen, his writing room and even the bedroom. None of it was very big, but it was so jarring to stand where he once stood that I took my time looking around.
The Wordsworths and Coleridge all hung out together in the very room I was standing in – which is pretty amazing.
There were all sorts of incredible artifacts around the cottage. Some of them included a sword owned by Coleridge during the war, quills he used to write with, and even locks of his hair from after he died.
Tiny snippets of his life were written on little cards in every room. I liked that, because it made it more real, like he wasn’t just a name attached to some image of ‘prolific writer’; it made his life real. He was a person, just like you and me, and he lived a life just like anyone else’s.
He just happened to have a way with words.
Later in the day, I went from Somerset to Devon and found myself in Agatha Christie’s holiday home. Apparently, she called it ‘the loveliest place in the world’. I can see why, because I’ve never seen a home quite like it.
Inside, it had every single Agatha Christie book ever published and probably almost every single edition, too. There were dolls that she played with, old typewriters she used, and furniture that has never been moved since the way she left them.
It was a very grand looking house and walking through it was like time travelling back to the 1930’s because pretty much everything was intact. In the bedroom, the clothes she wore were even hung up in the wardrobe. I spent a very long time staring at them, if I’m totally honest.
Outside, there were such lovely gardens and a beautiful boathouse down on the river right at the bottom. You could even see seals there if you stayed long enough. By the side of the house walking back round, I noticed there was an air raid shelter too. It was locked in chains but it, all the same, to think of the memories that are contained down there. Imagine how afraid they all must’ve been, locked tight, shut away – if they even ever had to use it.
The day ended with a stroll back down by the river.
Even though I know many people have touched these places – and that some people get to see these places every day – I still hold dear to me the fact that nothing has made me feel so happy like this for such a long time.
For a writer, to interact with these beautiful places, to actually get to touch the walls of writers’ history, it is truly memorable and I’m going to carry these memories – and hopefully this feeling – with me for a very long time.
I want nothing more than to write, and to get to do all of this, it just makes me want it even more.
emilycharlotteould 