Handwriting as clothing II
Stansted Park is an elegant house set in 1,700 acres of park and woodland in the south of England....
Of centuries and cows
These quirky comments by Steinbeck charmed me - first his reaction to the first room he chose to work in,...
A beautiful reading room
When visiting Leeds, my original university town, I decided to drop in on a few libraries, including the hulking Victorian...
A sensible sort of room
The boy slips out of a deadly dull afternoon tea in which two ladies are talking about clothing. He finds...
A writer’s reading room
During Easter in Aosta, I started reading a favourite writer, Patrick Leigh Fermor, beginning a two-volume treat, Mani and Roumeli. ...
A chapel for study – the reading room of the Oriental Institute
After a visit to the Oriental Institute museum in Chicago, I did a pit stop at...
The Saturday of Libraries
When we moved to the town of Nyon, I joined the municipal library. The building itself is worth writing about...
Librarian as satrap
Having known nothing but kindness among librarians, this striking description of a martinet guarding his books almost at the point...
All you need is love
Another description by Steinbeck's widow of yet another of his writing spaces, which comprised mostly rooms but some other curious...
Writing on wheels
Another in a series of accounts by John Steinbeck's wife, Elaine, of his perpetual search for the perfect writing space....
A visit to the Brontes
When I read the journals of Dorothy Wordsworth I had a yearning to visit the Wordsworth homes in the Lake...
A luminous spot in Chicago
What makes a city great? What makes a civilization? How about a bright, quiet, dazzling new building in the heart...
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