Your editorial (The Guardian view on writers’ houses: a museum of one’s own, 18 August) rightly laments that George Eliot has no publicly open home despite efforts to secure one. The same is true, remarkably, of William Blake, and he is at least as worthy a cause, and arguably even more influential.
Poet, painter, printmaker and author of the words behind Jerusalem, Blake has no open home anywhere. Of his nine addresses, only two survive. In London, the apartment he rented is disappearing behind new development. The other, his cottage in Felpham, West Sussex, where he and his wife, Catherine, lived from 1800 to 1803 and experienced an outburst of creativity, is the only one that could ever open to the public.
I am a trustee of the Blake Cottage Trust, which has spent two years saving it. In 2024 the roof was near collapse and the cottage was on Historic England’s at-risk register. Thanks to The National Lottery Heritage Fund and other foundations, artisans have rebuilt the roof and removed a Victorian extension, returning the cottage to its original form. But much of the fabric still needs full conservation before the cottage is truly saved and can be opened to all, and that work costs a great deal of money.
Raising it has not been easy. Even with the backing of the Heritage Fund and other trusts, we will need private philanthropy to fill a significant gap – and, as your article notes of Rydal Mount, heritage sites live or die on relevance and sustainability as much as repair.
That’s why our ambition goes beyond bricks and thatch to include opening an arts and education centre near the cottage, conceived not just as somewhere to visit but as a living place of creativity and inspiration in its own right – one with year-round appeal for the local community as much as for returning visitors, and one that properly honours Catherine Blake too, who learned to read under William’s guidance and helped hand-print and colour the plates of his illuminated books.
With the 2027 bicentenary of Blake’s death approaching, this is a moment when Guardian readers could make a real difference – to find out more, visit blakecottage.org
Richard Clemmow
Trustee, The Blake Cottage Trust
Your editorial gave a commendable overview of the important work that writers’ houses and museums have been doing to reconnect us with our literary heritage. Of course, turning a writer’s house into a museum is difficult, and not always viable. But this needn’t mean that the house cannot be saved for the nation and enjoyed by the public.
The late poet laureate Ted Hughes was born in a tiny end-terrace house in Mytholmroyd, West Yorkshire. He claimed his first years there “shaped everything”. But the house is too small to accommodate tour groups (who would inevitably inconvenience the neighbours), and parking is limited to just a space or two on a residential street. So, when the house was saved 20 years ago by The Elmet Trust, a local charity, it was opened to paying guests as a holiday cottage or writer’s retreat.
This fully immersive experience goes beyond a visit to any museum. It places you in the poet’s shoes. Sleeping in the cosy attic room that Hughes shared with his older brother, or in the bedroom where he was born, inspires because it impresses upon us how humble his start in life was. Leaflets guide you to his favourite walks through the glorious Yorkshire woods and hillsides where he played as a child. His writings often described these places, or the views from his windows, and indeed the rooms in the house itself. There are no display cases, no text panels in sight. This is about lived experience.
A George Eliot museum is indeed a worthy aspiration; a Ted Hughes museum scarcely less so. Yet while a museum is a fitting tribute to any great author, literary tourism at its best is about the readers and the fans as much as the writers. Interactive visitor centres such as Seamus Heaney HomePlace are as vital a part of the future as traditional museums. Engaging with literary landscapes and walks is no less important – for health, for wellbeing, for our environment, for our imaginations. But surely nothing can beat stepping inside the world of a writer by staying in their home, for which, as Genevieve Fox reported in a Guardian travel article in 2021, the range of options is surprisingly large.
Dr David Rudrum
Secretary, The Elmet Trust
Along with Rydal Mount and Dove Cottage, William Wordsworth also lived in two other Cumbrian houses which are open to the public. His childhood home, Wordsworth House in Cockermouth, owned by the National Trust, is currently only open for organised tours. The National Trust blames financial losses and low visitor numbers since the pandemic. Allan Bank in Grasmere, where Wordsworth lived briefly, is also owned by the National Trust, and open five days a week.
But Rydal Mount was considered by Wordsworth to be his favourite home, and it’s where he lived for most of his life, until his death in 1850. I spent several years working for the Wordsworth family and curators, and the house has a fascinating history as well as a glorious location and exciting future. Wordsworth himself was only a tenant; the house was eventually bought by the family – his great-great-granddaughter Mary Henderson acquired it in 1969.
Since then it’s seen the development of the five-acre gardens to plans drawn up by the poet. It has staged drama, music and poetry, co-hosted a film festival with the local cinema, and hosted weddings – including that of the poet’s great-great-great-great grandson Christopher Andrew. There was even, in the 1970s, a performance by the dance troupe Pan’s People when Miss UK contestants were filmed there.
It will be exciting to see how the Wordsworth Trust, which acquired Rydal Mount in March, takes the life of the house forward. The challenge is to re-engage visitors with the life and work of the greatest of the Romantic poets, and poetry generally. The Wordsworth family initiated a successful poetry competition for Cumbrian school pupils and planned to roll this out nationwide. Perhaps that will bring a new generation to appreciate more than just Daffodils.
Eileen Jones
Author of Rydal Mount: The Story of Wordsworth’s Home
