Literary Cornwall - 2 - A Miscellany
A. L. Rowse - he would have wanted to be first in the list - was born of a poor family in Clay Country, won a place at Oxford and became a Fellow of All Souls. Major historian, Shakespearean, controversialist; lived at Trenarren near St. Austell; memorial stands on nearby Black Head. Richard Carew - of Antony - was Cornwall's first historian, publishing his Survey of Cornwall in 1602; a plaque on Hall Walk opposite Fowey remembers him. D. H. Lawrence rented a house in Porthcothan in 1915, then at Higher Tregerthen Farm near Zennor in 1917. Hounded out as a German spy! Hugh Walpole, of Herries Chronicle fame, stayed in St. Ives, visited Truro renaming its cathedral Polchester in Cathedral and Old Ladies. John Betjeman, late 20th century Poet Laureate, loved his holiday home by Daymer Bay. He is buried in St. Enodoc churchyard. Virginia Woolf spent childhood summers at Talland House in St. Ives, from which she could see Godrevy Light (From the Lighthouse). Thomas Hardy came to St. Juliot in 1870 as architect. He stayed at the rectory and in 1874 married the rector's sister Emma Gifford. A Lawrence Whistler window in the church commemorates him. In A Pair of Blue Eyes St. Juliot appears as Endelstow, Boscastle as Castle Botterel. Charles Causley - poet and children's author - was a Launceston man. Maria Branwell, the Brontes' mother, lived at 25 Chapel Street, Penzance
Godrevy Light was inspiration for Virginia Woolf
Literary Cornwall - 3 - Winston Graham and the
More in Miscellanea
Literary Cornwall - 3 - Winston Graham and the Poldark Novels
Poldark Novels
Literary Cornwall - 4 - A. L. Rowse
Rowse
Man Engine
Cornishman Will Coleman is author, film maker, musician, educationalist and former director of Cornwall's renowned Kneehigh Theatre. He is also founder of Golden Tree Productions which promotes Conwall and its history. He is, too, an enthusiastic promoter of the Cornish language and has published a book about the Plen-a-Gwary, Cornwall's medieval amphitheatres. Also a talented engineer, in 2016 he and his team created Man Engine, a vast 33 foot high mechanical puppet of a Cornish Miner. This was first unveiled in Tavistock in 2016 and has since toured the country. We were fortunate enough to see Man Engine in early April 2018 on the Wadebrifge Showground. I say lucky but the weather was dreadful, the ground soggy and the site sufficiently uneven that a good view of the action was not always to be had. That didn't prevent us from enjoying Will's show. He is a great showman and entertaining raconteur. The original Man Engine was the device of ladders and platforms that transported miners as much as 1600 feet down mine shafts. The performance of Will Coleman's Man Engine was remarkable for such a giant robot. In adition, a young lad, perched precariously at the top of a 40 foot ladder, gave an inverted demonstration of the use of the ladders and platforms of the real-life Man Engine. It may have been wet and muddy on the Showground but it was well worth tolerating the conditions for Will Coleman's great show.