Arthur Machen’s Stoke Newington
2017; Oxford University Press; Volume: 64; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1093/notesj/gjx135
ISSN1471-6941
Autores Tópico(s)Travel Writing and Literature
ResumoSiegfried Sassoon wrote in Memoirs of an Infantry Officer, published in 1930, of a rambling discussion with fellow officers about things one noticed and places one knew: ‘Durley … put in a mild plea for Stoke Newington, which was where he lived; it contained several quaint old corners if you knew where to look for them.’1 It is quite possible that this remark had an influence on fantasy writer Arthur Machen’s choice of Stoke Newington as the supposed location of the visionary Canon’s Park in his short story ‘N’, published in 1936: You go in through a gateway, and he said it was like finding yourself in another country. Such trees, that must have been brought from the end of the world: there were none like them in England, though one or two reminded him of trees in Kew Gardens; deep hollows with streams running from the rocks; lawns all purple and gold with flowers, and golden lilies too, towering up into the trees, and mixing with the crimson of the flowers that hung from the boughs. And here and there, there were little summer-houses and temples, shining white in the sun, like a view in China … well-shaded walks that went down to green hollows bordered with thyme; and … architecture of fantastic and unaccustomed beauty, which seemed to speak of fairyland itself.2
Referência(s)