National Trust Holiday Lets

If one can’t be home for Christmas, the next best place is an historic property let through the National Trust. At the National Trust Holiday Cottages website, you’ll find a unique collection of over 370 properties in outstanding locations in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, available for short breaks, weekends away and holiday lets. Here are just a few:

On the sandy coast between Barmouth and Harlech in Wales, Egryn is a stunning Grade II listed medieval hall house dating from 1510, with 17th century alterations and a mid 19th-century front which looks across farmland to Cardigan Bay. At the heart of the house is the medieval hall with exposed, partially-aisled roof structure and a grand 17th-century fireplace. It has been faithfully restored by the National Trust using traditional building techniques: admire the skill and beauty of this work, providing a rare opportunity to stay in a Welsh hall house of this calibre. It is furnished in keeping with each period of its development. Commissioned by the National Trust, a replica of the original Egryn table dating from the early 1700’s has been made from local wind blown oak and the Trust’s Ganllywd Estate, and now has pride of place in the grand medieval dining room. Egryn is a working farm, through which there is a public footpath which leads past a profusion of Scheduled Ancient Monuments and stretches from the seashore to the uplands of the Rhinogydd Range. It has a wealth of archaeological and historic interest. There is a large private garden with nature trees, shrubbery and patio area. With its grand medieval hall sitting and dining rooms, Victorian parlour, skilled craftsmanship, beautiful furnishings and large private garden, Egryn is the perfect choice for that special occasion, family holidays and get togethers.

An exceptionally pretty cottage lying in the idyllic surroundings of the walled garden on the Florence Court estate, just eight miles from the town of Enniskillen. Rose Cottage is furnished to a high standard with views over the peaceful garden.

Godolphin House – Cornwall -This hugely atmospheric house sits in beautiful gardens and in great walking country. It is also only a short drive to lovely sandy beaches on both the north and south Cornish coasts, so makes a fabulous base for a great seaside holiday with a wonderful house to retreat to, away from the hustle and bustle of the resorts on busy days. The main entrance is via an imposing pillared portico running along the front of the house. There is a rear private garden area specifically for holiday cottage guests, but the main gardens are also available for use when not open to the public.

Housesteads – Northumberland – This Victorian farmhouse, built in the 19th century, was home to the Thompson’s who farmed the area and also played a role as custodians of the Wall. The sitting room in the cottage was used by John Clayton when he was working on the excavation of Housesteads Fort. Clayton was the Town Clerk in Newcastle and was involved in the development of the city in the 1800’s. He is renowned for his interest in preserving Hadrian’s Wall and is credited with being the first person in the world to use his own wealth to buy sites of archaelogical interest. He bought land along the wall to stop the quarrying and removal of stones being taken to be used elsewhere. John Clayton was involved in excavations through out most of his life and was said to be still excavating up to the age of 94. The cottage is located just 100yrds from the ruins of Housesteads Fort and has outstanding views towards the North Pennines and Hadrian’s Wall.

Ho, ho, ho, indeed.

Downton Abbey… Upstairs, Downstairs and/or Brideshead Revisited Redux? A Personal Opinion

It’s Ba-a-a-aa-aack!
PBS is re-running the first episodes of Downton Abbey in

December 2011, as a prelude to showing the latest season, seen in the UK last fall.  I expect a big fuss on many loops and blogs as again we re-hash our opinions — both positive and negative — on the show.

Our frequent guest blogger, Jo Manning, was in England to see season two — and here is her view of the new episodes.

Downton Abbey… Upstairs, Downstairs and/or Brideshead Revisited Redux?  A Personal Opinion
by Jo Manning
As I put fingers to computer keyboard, I am reminded of that line in the vice-presidential debate in 1988 between Texas Senator Lloyd Bentsen and Indiana Senator Dan Quayle, where Quayle kept making references to himself as a new Jack Kennedy.  Bentsen delivered the scathing putdown:
            “Senator, I served with Jack Kennedy, I knew Jack Kennedy, Jack Kennedy was a friend of mine. Senator, you’re no Jack Kennedy.”
In relation to this 2011 ITV mini-series, Downton Abbey, I am moved to paraphrase that excoriating putdown:  
            “ITV, writer Julian Fellowes, the cast of Downton Abbey, I watched Upstairs,         Downstairs and Brideshead Revisited devotedly, and many, many times.  Gentlemen, ladies, you are neither of those truly wonderful productions, not by a  very long shot.” I would add, “You are absurd and unrealistic, for starters!”

I saw the second episode of this series – which had begun with the repercussions of the sinking of the Titanic upon the fortunes of a wealthy earl – the Earl of Grantham — and his family – an American-born heiress wife and three daughters – with my daughter in West London.  She’d warned me, “You have to see this to believe it.”  She was correct.  We could not stop laughing at the terribly clichéd plot, the wooden acting, the stereotyped characters, and the overall, well, yes, the overall silliness of this production.  And I’m not talking de gustibus…here; this is more than a mere matter of taste.
But the amazing – and, truly, unbelievable aspect – of this venture is that most people – especially those Anglophiles in the United States – ADORE IT! It has received awards, including prestigious US Emmys for outstanding t.v. mini-series/movie, for writing, for directing, and for the incomparable Maggie Smith in the supporting actress category. Smith is the only palpable reason for watching this awful production; her chewing up and spitting out the scenery is a highly seasoned tour de force, simply delicious. (The mini-series also won for cinematography and costumes at the Creative Arts Emmys.)

How did it happen that it beat out Pillars Of The Earth, for heaven’s sake, a magnificently produced mini-series with outstanding acting that was based on Ken Follett’s popular novel?  It has to be Anglophilia, simply that.
And the awards did not stop there. Downton Abbey entered the Guinness Book of World Record as “the most critically acclaimed television show” of the year. (Brideshead Revisited garnered this honor in 1981 for the original t.v. series.) Well, no one was polling a certain family in West London, for sure!
To compound this unbelievable love-fest, ITV confirmed in November that a third series has been commissioned and will air beginning in September 2012. Truly, I am gobsmacked L

Where do I start, not wanting to give away what happens in the second series… Well, there’s Hugh Bonneville – never the most accomplished of actors — as the Earl of Grantham, who acts as if he has an iron rod up his bum and whose monologues to the servants and others are stunningly stupid; Lady Mary, his eldest daughter, played by Michelle Dockery – whose acting gamut runs from A to D, arrogance to disdain — gives us no reason whatsoever to sympathize with her plight as the eldest-daughter-who-has-to-marry-well. She has obviously matriculated from the same acting school as Mr Bonneville. Chemistry between Lady Mary and anyone simply does not exist. She is a cold fish, with nothing lovable about her; the idea that she would fall into bed with a young handsome Turk she has only just met is totally off the wall. And, too, chemistry is also sadly lacking between the youngest (and wannabe social activist daughter) and the Irish chauffeur. Their “attraction” is excruciating, painful, non-existent.
Poor, still beautiful Elizabeth McGovern is the Earl’s rich American wife…  She used to be a pretty good actress – remember how exquisite she was when only a teenager, in Ordinary People? — but the dialogue coming out of her mouth lays her low. How does she not choke on it?
The servants also have their share of pretty awful characters. The butler, played by veteran character actor Jim Carter, has the same rod up his bum that the Earl of Grantham and Lady Mary strut around with, and don’t get me started on the whiny, sycophantic valet! His performance…oh, gag me with a spoon!

A major element of the first series was the problem with Lady Mary unable to inherit the earldom, since she is a woman, and male primogeniture prevails in England. (Recent events with the children of Prince William and Kate Middleton notwithstanding, as Downton Abbey is set in the first decades of the 20th century and the Earl and Countess of Grantham are not royals.)  Fellowes has the aristos try to get this changed. Well – and Fellowes should be well aware of this, coming from the class he does – you cannot do this, the conditions of inherited titles being what they are. Everyone, then, would know it!
It is patently absurd that the earl and his family should try to buck this, but take a look at this link to an article by A.N. Wilson for a possible clue as to why this storyline might have so interested Julian Fellowes:  http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2037077/Downton-Abbeys-creator-Julian-Fellowes-biggest-snob-Britain.html  It is all about how Fellowes is enraged that his wife cannot inherit a title.
The piece is scorching.  As well it should be.  Do note this comment of A.N. Wilson, too, which echoes exactly what I have been saying:
            “Fellowes is an absurd, rather than malign, figure in our public life, so one would not wish to respond t
o this latest bid for publicity with too much of a po-face. I acknowledge I’m in a minority when it comes to Downton Abbey, and that most of the nation will be gripped by the new series of this unrealistic depiction of upper-class life in the old days.”
For those who’ve not come across this expression, po-faced translates as humorless or disapproving. A.N. Wilson is an outspoken journalist and commentator and a prolific writer of fictional and biographical works. Look him up in WorldCat:  http://worldcat.org/identities/lccn-n77-3675.
 Will not go into the editing problems, the telephone poles in the village, etc.  That is sloppy film editing, nothing to do with the problems with Fellowes’ writing and the lousy acting that prevails. (Still cannot believe he got an Oscar for Gosford Park, an entertaining film with several great moments… It could be his one shining moment, though; so much else that he has done is so bad.)

When Anglophiles who love good English drama of the sort carried by PBS’s Masterpiece Theatre can anticipate with so very little difficulty the next line coming out of a character’s mouth, that’s…not good. As a comedy, Downton Abbey succeeds beautifully; as a drama, it is embarrassing. Drama should surprise us, enlighten us, and make us ponder possibilities, not bore us to death, in my opinion.

Really, need anyone say more?
Well, yes.  From a Daily Mail article – and, spoiler alert! – don’t click on this link unless you desperately do want to know – despite my caveats — what happens in Series Two:
“ ‘I know it’s a cliché,’ he cried at one point, shouting to be hear over the thundering ‘background’ music and Lady Mary doing her special blinking vole look.
“Cliché? That hasn’t stopped Fellowes before, we bellowed back.
“Oh dear. It’s terrible. It’s wonderful. It’s a disaster. It’s terrific. And without our Downton fix, what are we going to do to amuse ourselves on Sunday nights now?”
[Oh, be still my heart… “Lady Mary doing her special blinking vole look.”  Perfect, just perfect! Could not have put it more perfectly myself J]

Well, here’s a thought… Go out and rent the wonderful film of the Isabel Colegate book, The Shooting Party.  The book was published in 1980; the film was released in 1985. It is the real thing…English aristocrats seeing the ebbing of the world they knew, on the eve of the First World War, and they are both works of art, the book and the movie. Yes, really, they are genuinely works of art, not trumped up absurdities.

But did you know he was an actor before turning to writing?  Not a terribly successful actor.  Probably his most memorable role was as the overweight, annoying neighbor who tries to win the widowed Susan Hamps
hire’s heart in the television sitcom Monarch Of The Glen. Yes, that was Fellowes: Kilwillie!

From the IMDB website, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0088111/ :
            “Autumn, 1913: on the eve of the Great War, a small party of lords and      ladies gather at the Hertfordshire estate of Sir Randolph Nettleby. A code  of propriety governs all: dress, breakfast, relations with the estate’s   peasants, courtship, shooting, adultery. Lionel Stephens, who is courting   Sir Randolph’s daughter, gets into a shooting competition with Lord Gilbert    Hartlip; Lord Gilbert’s wife carries on discreet affairs; a pamphleteer          circles the estate calling for no more killing, and Sir Robert’s grandson   hopes to protect a wild duck he’s befriended. A way of life is ending: Lord Gilbert’s violation of the gentlemen’s code suggests internal rot as the real    world presses in.”

James Mason gives the performance of his acting career as Sir Randolph Nettleby, who hosts what will probably be the last gathering of his aristocratic family and friends as the world prepares to blow asunder. The cast of The Shooting Party is superb, absolutely first-rate – John Gielgud, James Fox, Robert Hardy, Cheryl Crawford, Gordon Jackson, Dorothy Tutin, to name only a few — and the story bittersweet and memorable.  No posturing, no bombast, no nonsensical plotting, and, best of all, that Julian Fellowes fellow had nothing whatsoever to do with it.

Thanks, Jo, for your uninhibited opinions and your suggestion of The Shooting Party.  We invite our readers’ opinons too — please comment on your views of Downtown Abbey.  Do you love it — or were you disappointed?  Come one, come all!  We want to hear from you. 

That Woman is Coming to the US

I wonder how many of us can add a guilty fascination with Wallis Simpson to our list of insignificant transgressions?  Admire her or hate her, she remains one of those figures who continues to fascinate.  Last summer, Wiedenfeld & Nicolson published That Woman by Anne Sebba in the UK — and it will be out in March 2012 in the US from St. Martin’s.  The New York Times recently carried an article about the book, which is here.

Above, Anne Sebba, author of That Woman.  Sebba is a lecturer and tv presenter as well as the author of a number of books. According to her website (here), she particularly likes to write about strong women.  Other subjects she has written of include such disparate personages as Jennie Jerome Churchill, Mother Teresa, and Laura Ashley. Of course, the most scandalous aspect of the Duchess of Windsor book was eagerly received by newspapers. Here is an article from the Daily Mail.

Above, the wedding, in 1937, in France.  Bessie Wallis Warfield was born in Pennsylvania in 1896. The story of how she became the woman who made a king abdicate, one of the most hated women ever, yet a style trend setter and source of endless public attention has been told over and over. Nevertheless, it will be told many more times I am sure.

In many ways, I think the Duke and Duchess led a lonely life of wandering, early in their marriage accused (with some justification it seems) of being Nazi sympathizers, and later of being only too eager to accept whatever largesse came their way from social climbers, publicity seeking hangs-on, and celebrity wannabes.

The Duke had a lifelong obsession with the fact his wife could not be correctly addressed as Her
Royal Highness, and he insisted on everyone calling her by that title — which to me would only have made it worse, as every time she heard it, the phrase must have grated.  She was known for some witty phrases — “a woman can never be too rich or too thin.”  Her clothing and jewels were much admired.

The famous jeweled flamingo clip, above in an auction promotional shot, was sold for a record price. It was made by Cartier in 1940 —  costume jewelry replicas are not hard to find.

Madonna’s film about That Woman — titled W.E. — is set to open in February in the U.S. It got some good reviews from film festivals. And the trailer, below, looks interesting.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1536048/

In the meantime, while we wait for the book That Woman and the movie W.E., you might take a look at the 1978 television series Edward and Mrs. Simpson, which I recall with pleasure. Though just how guilty a pleasure it was, I shall have to reassess!

It originally ran in seven parts, and it starred Edward Fox as Edward and Cynthia Harris as Wallis.  Just the thing for an evening when the snow begins to fall and you have a nice bowl of popcorn on hand.  Or make that a couple of evenings!

Like the topic of the late Diana, Princess of Wales, the story has everything — romance, scandal, royalty, and a dysfunctional family. What more could we ask?

Save The Cleveland Street Workhouse – An Update

You may recall that we ran a post a few months back asking for your support in saving the Cleveland Street Workhouse in London, which has connections to Charles Dickens.
The Cleveland Street workhouse was originally built in 1775 and it is the best preserved Georgian era workhouse in Central London, one of only three remaining in the Capital. Here is the latest update on the status of the project:

Thank you for continuing to support our campaign to save the Cleveland Street
Workhouse. Your signature, together with nearly 6000 others, was vital in our
effort of obtaining listed status for the workhouse. As you will hopefully be
aware, the workhouse was granted Grade II listed status by the Secretary of
State in March 2011, however it has come to our attention that the building may
again be under threat. We are therefore asking for your help once again.

University College London NHS Foundation Trust recently decided to evict the
current guardians of the site, leaving the building exposed to possible further
decay, speeding up its demise. With the recent spate of squatting in the area,
our group is also concerned that squatters may take over the building and damage
it, further exacerbating the situation.

The Cleveland Street Workhouse has served as short term accommodation for young
professionals for more than 3 years. The inhabitants have been placed within the
building through a “Protection by Occupation” scheme, which forbids squatters
from occupying the premises and helps prevent decay. Without constant monitoring
and heating during the winter months, the elements will take their toll.

In light of these potentially disastrous developments, we would like to call
upon UCLH NHS Foundation Trust to reconsider this decision.

If you could take a moment of your time to write to the University College
London Hospital Trust expressing your concern about recent developments, you
would once again provide invaluable help to preserve the building. Due to the
urgent nature of the situation, please address your correspondence direct to
UCLH NHS Foundation Trust’s CEO:

Sir Robert Naylor
Chief Executive
UCLH NHS Foundation Trust
235 Euston Road
London NW1 2BU

e-mail: robert.naylor@uclh.nhs.uk

For more information, please visit The Cleveland Street Workhouse website.