Stonehenge is a National Trust site, but the English Heritage organization has partnered with them to create a beyond-the-ropes experience. For an additional fee (usually entry would have been "free" for us because of those National Trust passes), and advance reservations you can get tickets to arrive either before, or after, regular hours. In a group of about 25 people you can wander amongst the stones (the standard visit consists of viewing from within a roped-off path), for an hour. The Dad was persistent and lucky enough to secure such tickets for us, but unfortunately, said tickets were for 6:45am. Thus, our 5:15am wake up call. Grrrrr. Fortunately, everybody had a good attitude, and it ended up being very fun -- if wet (yes, raining, again... out came the shower caps and mime shoes). I will stand by what I've said since the first time that I saw it: the first impact is surprisingly exciting (I expected it to be anticlimactic because of all the hype), but it doesn't take long to exhaust the material.
Since the creation of Stonehenge looks to have started about 5,000 years ago, there aren't a lot of stone cold facts. Research has determined that the rocks came from Wales -- over 200 miles away. How, or why are questions that are still up for debate.
Short of sitting down and sketching or painting (would have been cool if not for the RAIN), I couldn't think of much more to do once all physical angles were considered. I wished that we had found a book or something that explored some of the current theories/intellectual angles.
Back in the car, and suddenly everybody had to go to the bathroom. Probably the number one irritation with traveling -- having to find bathrooms (number two being getting laundry done). We were in the area of Highclere Castle (Downton Abbey), so even though it was not one of the days when it's open to the public, we were those obnoxious Americans who traveled down the road a bit.
That certainly didn't get us any closer to finding the loo (can you see us knocking, "So sorry -- were were in the neighborhood -- would you mind terribly if we just popped in for a sec to use the toilet?"). Sadly, some probably could see us doing just that... Well, we restrained ourselves... until we found a very cool pub/hotel to avail ourselves of. There was a cool antique hockey game that The Dad and the kids played for a few pence. We didn't know it at the time, but apparently it was the coach house of the Highclere Castle. I would have taken a better picture had I known.
Oxford. Because of the way so much of the town, and especially the colleges are built -- around courtyards and with passageways (I'm sure that it's a very fascinating arial view), for the visitor it feels like a different experience each time. Except, there are some things that need to be done each and every time... By the time we got there The Boy had to go to the bathroom again. The Dad has this thing for the Eagle and Child pub (where the Inklings met Tuesdays at 10am to discuss their writing, the Iceland Sagas, and nobody will ever know what else), but it's never on his "agenda" to just go in and get a table and relax... So instead we're the tourists who huddle in the doorway, and try to see what can be seen from that ever-noble position. Having already played that game twice, when he suggested stopping by the "Bird and Baby" to see if The Boy could use the facilities, I let him to it. The rest of us stayed in the car. Sure enough, no toilets for the huddling tourists, so they were told to go next door. And yet, somewhere in those few minutes before they were redirected, The Dad got his fix and came back feeling like he could check that off the list for this trip. Until next time Eagle and Child!
To continue with our touristy Inklings stalkings (remember: we want our kids to have cerebralties... and yes, I do rather fancy my term that I coined...), we moved along to Tolkien's house. We were told that his stories created a cult following very early on, so if you look to see what his Oxford address was you will find that there were several, as he moved around a bit to try to maintain some privacy. Tosh! You can't throw The Dad off the trail. We drove by one where he lived for a bit, where the historical plaque is located... not far from the alarm system notice.
The Tolkiens are buried not far, and while I don't think that we would have bothered, since it was still a bit early for our next stop to open, and I had mentioned that their elfin names were put on the stones, The Boy requested that we go (he might have said that he would like to learn elvish, but that would have put us way past our nerd quota, so we all pretended that didn't happen).
Luthien and Beren were apparently the names Tolkien created for his wife and himself. The Boy was disappointed that there wasn't more of the elvish language. I felt it was quite enough. Wow. I mean, just like "hoarding" and "collecting" is a micro-fine line, I'm pretty sure that "cool genius" and "absolute nerd" straddle a similarly delicate distinction. The grave was not what I was expecting -- what with the straggling random plants (that have been made more unkept looking by the hairbands and jewelry left by fans) The entire cemetery was like this -- perhaps some could say cheerful and homey, I might say cluttered and untidy. So imagine my surprise when The Sister pointed out a sign that said it had won cemetery of the year. What? First of all, who created such a contest? And second of all, even though, as she pointed out, it was a few years ago, what could the criteria possibly be if this cemetery was a past winner fairly recently? Though, one has to admit, that the rack of watering cans is charming.
Alice Liddell bought her candy at a little shop that is now called The Alice Shop. It was featured in Carroll's books, as were many other little nuggets through Oxford (the bell tower, the spiraling staircase, etc. and so forth -- AGAIN, daily things becoming magical by being repurposed into art). We stopped there for a few pretty things, and then crossed the street to the oldest university in the English-speaking world.
In the courtyard of the Bodleian Library there is a sign that says to be silent. I wish people adhered to it, as I imagine the hush of moving, but silent people in that stone space would create proper library/Oxfordish/academic ambiance. We were there looking for the current exhibit called "Magical Books: From the Middle Ages to Middle-earth." It was small, but amazing. I guess if you're Oxford you have a lot of resources. For example, on display were the very scrolls where George Ripley (15th century writer and alchemist) lays out the steps for the philosopher's stone. And of course, in the same case is J.K. Rowling's book... It certainly brought her vast wealth and a bit of immortality by paying attention to Mr. Ripley.
The exhibit did a bang up job of uniting the history/legend to where it pops up in literature through the ages. They also created little "dialogues" between literature and literature (text to text connections, if you will). Along the walls were books of magic to peruse (from Sir Gawain and the Green Knight to Pullman's trilogy), but inside a case something drew my attention: Beatrix Potter's Squirrel Nutkin (that woman is apparently the patron saint of this trip). The reason why it was there was because C.S. Lewis said that a world opened for him when he first read it and considered animals living lives similar to humans -- having moral dilemmas, and adventures, and lessons, and voices. And it was because of that that he created a new land -- Boxen -- where animals and children could interact. It would be decades later before Narnia came around, but Boxen was the seed. And Beatrix Potter was the gardener.
We stopped by the library's gift shop (yes, you read that right... there's always a gift shop...) to get the book that's a companion to the exhibit and the kids found a contest. There was properly-medieval stone dragon decoration that you could win if your name for the dragon was selected. The kids were all over this. There was deliberation and a discussion on plagiarism and some panic as we tried to hurry them along. As they were scribbling out the "reason for" portion I happened to read the terms and conditions of the contest (something like: selection will be based on strength of analysis of existing material as well as ability to incorporate unique elements as evidenced by the... ). It was easily as intense as my application for grad school. Finally, I saw that the contest was only for 18 and up, and from that we were reminded that Oxford is a place that does not cater to the feeble-minded. We slipped the contest forms into my bag and walked on.
Of course somebody had to go to the bathroom, since it had been a full thirty-six minutes since our last exposure to every virus and fungal infection of for grabs in a public restroom. We had plans to see the Dodo bird at the Natural History, so we pushed on. As it turned out, most of the museum is packed up because of some roof work that is happening (the packing up is actually kind of funny -- as everything is perfectly packaged around the item -- so a giraffe looks like a giraffe still... I don't know why it made me laugh -- similar to giving somebody an umbrella for a gift and wrapping it to maintain the shape of the umbrella: you'll never guess what this is!) -- but they shunt you around to the Pitt Rivers Museum, which is connected. After using the facilities, we were wandering around the Pitt Rivers and one of the kids asked me what type of museum it was. My best guess was an anthropology museum? Essentially it was Snowshill Manor all over again, but much bigger and in the setting of a museum, ergo not nearly as charming. As it turns out, my guess was about right -- it's "Oxford's collection of anthropology and world archeology." But because of that question I had a thought that we talked about later: the line between art/design and history is mighty, mighty slim. In fact, it could probably be said that it's through art/design that the history, religion, politics, environmental relationship, etc. and so forth, of man is maintained. There is no other way to "bottle" up a civilization (except for writing, but that can be considered an art form). If all of our written words go online, and a lot of our art/design goes virtual, what tangible/not-deletable items would be left to understand our society? In short, where would our history go? A secondary thought: considering that art is how history is documented, it doesn't seem wise to streamline art out of school. Just some thoughts. The museum was thought-provoking.
We have a connection to Ukrainian eggs.
"Smallest doll in the world" -- from 1944. About the size of a pencil eraser.
There was an art show being hosted by the museum, so this contemporary exhibit was fascinating. She made replica shoes the size of her mum's and grandmother's (their feet had been bound in China), and put their pictures on them, and then inserted them into resin castes of her own feet. I know I mumble on about preserving things from the past, but let it never be said that I don't acknowledge the advances that have been made that are enlightened.
We sniffed out some more of those cornish pasties and headed out for our 2pm appointment at The Kilns -- home of C.S. Lewis.
After fumbling and bumbling around at the backdoor, we were finally noticed and brought through the front door to join our group (a tour needs to be arranged in advance through the C.S. Lewis foundation). The house was Lewis's for over thirty years. He bought it with his brother and Janie Moore (the mother of his friend who at one time he had a bit of a romantic relationship with, but it eventually fizzled and it became more like a mother-son relationship; before Lewis and Moore went to war both promised the other that if one didn't return the other would take care of the other's family; Moore died and Lewis did come home and took care of his mother and sister). Eventually the mother moved on to a constant-care home because of her dementia and the daughter got married. So it was two bachelors and apparently the house became a bit of a hell hole that friends didn't even enjoy coming to (i.e. they smoked so much that the walls were brown and they would grind the ashes into the carpet; there was a quote that the house was held together by the stacks and stacks of books and cobwebs).
It gets better. Upstairs Lewis's room was next to Mrs. Moore's room, separated only by a door. To keep things proper a lock was put on the door and Lewis would enter and exit his room via an external steep staircase/ladder. Must have been awesome in the winter and/or the middle of the night. After Mrs. Moore moved out her room became his study... but the key had been lost, so he continued to go all the way out and around and through the house to go from his room to his study. When he married Joy (the divorced American woman he was married to briefly before she died of cancer -- see: Shadowlands), and she attempted to bring some civility to the place she allegedly said: "Men, there are locksmiths in this country," and she had the door between the two rooms unlocked. I bring this up because I love to be reminded that total space-cadets can also be brilliant. We all have things we excel at and things we stink at. The more we strengthen our passions and contribute, the more willing the world is to overlook our shortcomings.
Upstairs was also the room where the children evacuating the city during the bombings would stay on their way out to their assigned homes in the country (they would come in groups of four girls at a time). The story goes that Mrs. Moore kept a very strict household, so Lewis would use a string to send extra food and treats up to the girls' room from outside.
City kids heading to the country during the war, a bachelor host, a cranky "housekeeper" -- combine that with his conversion to Christianity and his made-up worlds of animals interacting with children and you have the Narnia series.
Doorway that was locked for years while he used the exterior staircase.
It's a replica based off of pictures, but I will say that Lewis could have chucked his job as a writer and designed for Anthropologie -- look at that lovely Tiffany-blue farm table/stools/counter set-up.
Few things in the house were original because the family that bought the house after the Lewis brothers completely gut-renovated. The C.S. Lewis Foundation came in and restored it, but most of the furnishings are period, but not Lewis's (as the guide pointed out, probably a good thing considering all that smoking going on). That said, the doorknob there was original, so everybody took a good turn on it while passing, and the typewriter was Lewis's brother's -- and he was the one to type out all the manuscripts. So from these keys came the books.
And here is that staircase that led to his bedroom.
The guide giving the tour was an American studying at Oxford. He interns for the foundation -- giving tours and maintaining the place -- in exchange for cheap rent. When we all piled back into the car the lesson that I most wanted the kids to remember: "If you are ever an intern somewhere and people are going to be coming through the space that you're living in, please, for the love of all that's right in the world, get some baskets or something to chuck your stuff into every morning. It was so distracting." I glowed with pride when The Sister and the offspring all agreed, and in fact were able to make mention of the specific personal items that were distracting (for The Sister and me it was his wife's shoes... I kept thinking: She has so many, and none of them are cute... Granted, I shouldn't be thinking such harshness at all, but I certainly shouldn't be thinking that when I'm trying to get into the mood of C.S. Lewis's life).
And we move on.
To Great Missenden, where Roald Dahl lived in a great home with great gardens called Gipsy House. In the garden was his writing hut. Gipsy House (or rather, the garden) is only open a few times a year -- we went last time -- but for the rest of the year there is a cute little museum on the main street, where the contents of his writing hut, and other memorabilia have been moved. There are also interactive exhibits, fun little videos, simple coloring/art pages, a cute activity book, etc... To the museum is where we went.
There's a machine and you have to answer quirkily worded questions from Roald Dahl books to determine your level of sparkiness. I was as sparky as Aunt Sponge. In my defense, my spawn were harassing me, breaking my focus, giving red-herring suggestions... In other words, I would be a brilliant parent, if I didn't have kids.
The museum incorporates a lot of ideas and insight from other writers, and since I referenced Kazuo Ishiguro (Remains of the Day) earlier, I thought I would include this, as we have a 10-year old around here who would completely appreciate a 10-year old calling schoolmates "dear fellow."
Original critters from the movie. It's fun to see that Wes Anderson recreated elements from Dahl's writing hut.
You can get things like "Bogtrotter Chocolate Cake" and the "Whizpopper" drink in the cafe.
You can also go around the town and see things that make appearances in the books. For example, these pumps inspired the pumps in Danny, Champion of the World. AGAIN with the real-life making its way into literature.
At Dahl's grave people leave notebooks and pencils. The Boy ran back to where I was sitting in the car (totally, and completely worn out, thank-you-very-much... and I might have been eating Bogtrotter cake) and told us excitedly about the pencils, so I retrieved the little ones they got at the museum to fill out their activity books, and they happily went and left their offering. I appreciate that they know to appreciate him. That they don't feel entitled to good books -- they know that they are gifts. (Note: I have mixed feelings about taking/posting pictures of graves, but I came down on the side of going ahead with it, as recognizing death is something we try to do in a natural way, and so it's part of the trip, and blah, blah... being respectful... blah, blah... mixed feelings, yeah...)
Mixed feelings, thin lines, we are dealing with a lot of nuances here.
When it was announced that there would be Harry Potter movies I remember that some tempers flared. Some people felt strongly that it would undercut the value of the books, of all books, of literacy, etc. and so forth... Some days I agreed, and other days I was kind of curious as to what a movie would be like, and if, like The Wizard of Oz, it could be its own thing. Maybe encouraging more reading, not less. I agreed that that terrible thing happens of once you get a visual of something it's very difficult to push it aside while reading and be able to find out how you see it for yourself. That was something lovely that the quirky guide on the Swallows and Amazons tour said -- that no movie, not even real life (i.e. the very lake it was based on) should ever displace the experience you have of making a book your own.
But it didn't matter what anybody thought, the movie was coming anyway. And, as it drew closer, most Potter fans jumped on board. I was substitute teaching a high school literature class the day it was opening and these two Spike Jonze-ish kids were talking to me about how excited they were and one busted the advance-purchased movie ticket out of his wallet and kissed it. Clearly, if I was his mum, and I knew exactly where he was going to be on a Friday night (watching Harry Potter) I think I'd be pretty tickled, and so at that moment, I felt like the HP magic had in some way extended to the movies.
The movies came, and some were better than others, but good or bad (and there was a lot of both, but I think it ultimately came down squarely in good) a new culture was born. Potter fans were now bonded over not just shared adventures gleaned from the book, but now there were shared images... a shared franchise. And we all watched three cute kids grow up together, and so we didn't just live vicariously in the magical world, but we also lived vicariously in the world of Daniel Radcliffe, and Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint -- three kids that got to grow up with a different kind of magic.
How do we handle Harry Potter in our family? Very carefully. For the past three summers we have added a new book, so this year we started at the beginning of the first book and we will read through the end of the fourth book. You only get to read a book for the first time once, and we wanted it to be as age appropriate as possible, so they get the most out of them. Further, it's a way to kind of let them have the same experience that those of us who lived through the Potter years got to have -- that crushing feeling when the book came to an end, knowing that it would be at least a year until the next one came out... and then the swelling happiness that came when the new book was in your hands. Delayed gratification. The kids do get really excited every May when they know it's coming. And after each book is when they get to watch the coordinating movie.
Anyway, that's all to say that on our way into London we went through the Warner Brothers Studio Tour London, The Making of Harry Potter. Some might not know that all the movies were filmed in a studio outside of London, but it was... and all those goodies from the eight movies are on display. Added bonus was that this week happened to be the "meet the animal actors week." We were surprisingly taken by the whole thing. We took a billion pictures because I guess we wanted proof that we had seen that exact item when next we view the films.
Originally they had a lot of the floating candles suspended, but when they started burning through the string and falling they were worried for the safety of the actors, so they went to the computer-generated variety.
Dolores Umbridge's office was cool. As it was animal week, they had five kittens there that they had trained the same way they trained the kittens for Professor Umbridge's plates (yes, it was footage of real kittens that they overlaid on the plates).
All of the tiny details that the graphic designers did were mind blowing. Things that I don't think that I ever noticed, or could probably even see on screen, were perfect to the letter.
One of the Hedwigs there. Inside we met one of the Pigwidgeons and the trainer started talking to the kids about the patches on their sweatshirts. She's from the states, but they flew her here for animal actors week, as she had been one of the owl trainers for all the movies. I asked her if her degree was in zoology (I like to subtly remind the kids that these cool jobs often have college degrees behind them). Her degree was actually in primatology, but she only job she could find at the time where she lived in Florida was with Orlando studios, and from there learned how to train other animals, etc. Interesting.
Perhaps the inside secret that most surprised us was finding out that in the shots when Hagrid needed to be truly enormous he had an animatronic head on.
The plans for all the sets were amazing -- every detail considered.
But most amazing was the grand finale -- the actual model of Hogwarts that is used for all the external shots. The lighting was very atmospheric, but made for crap photos. Walking around it was really fun (it's pretty big), seeing every tiny, perfect detail.
We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, but we were very worn out. When we arrived at our hotel where we will be staying for the next five days on the south bank we had to unload our car that was being returned to the rental company. Ugh. Even though we tried to consolidate we were so the hillbillies walking up the stairs with bags and papers and food and rain boots. All the employees were gathering around to help, but The Dad declined, just wanting to push on, and so the rest of us followed suit... The Sister and I trying not to giggle for fear our armloads of stuff would fall.
