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[Assistant] After three years in London, the call of Dorset again pulled Thomas Hardy homeward, and it was to a plot of land on the outskirts of Dorchester that this particular native returned.


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[Assistant] You see before you, Maxgate, the house that Hardy used his architectural skill to design, and his family building connections to construct, where he would live for the rest of his life.


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[Assistant] Inspired by the close proximity of Dorchester, Hardy began to write The Mayor of Casterbridge. But a newspaper article giving an account of a man selling his wife also gave our author food for thought and underpins the plot of this remarkable novel.


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[Assistant] If you wander around Dorchester, Hardee's Castabridge, you'll find many of the locations, including the house of Michael Henchard, the eponymous mayor, which is now a bank.


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[Assistant] In his story, Henchard sells his wife Susan and his baby daughter to a sailor.


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[Assistant] But when they return to find him years later, Hardy reunites them at an amphitheatre from Dorchester's Roman past, known as the Maundry Rings.


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[Assistant] In the end, Henchard pays for his misdeeds, dying alone, a broken and bitterly disappointed man.


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[Assistant] It would seem that his creator was also feeling somewhat depressed at this time, if these words from a letter to a friend are anything to go by.


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[Assistant] You would be quite shocked if I were to tell you how many weeks and months in bygone years I have gone to bed wishing never to see daylight again.


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[Assistant] No doubt, Hardy's troubled marriage contributed to his sadness, but as at the time he planted a veritable forest of trees around Maxgate, he started work on the woodlanders, while Emma became even more isolated.


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[Assistant] Even so, the literary world did offer its compensations. The Hardys would always head to London to do the season, as the author had become something of a celebrity.


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[Assistant] Also, there were happier moments back at Max Gate when Hardy and Emma rode around Dorset on their bicycles. And when they travelled abroad, they fulfilled Hardy's dream of visiting Rome to follow in the footsteps of the poets Shelley and Keats.


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[Assistant] As well as finding the house where Keats died at the foot of the Spanish steppes, the Hardys were overcome by the drama of the forum on Palatine Hill.


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[Assistant] And when they returned home, our author was ready to tell the whole world his views on what he perceived as the injustices of Victorian society.


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[Assistant] From his study at Maxgate, Hardy set to work on tests of the d'Urbervilles, tackling such taboo subjects as rape, illegitimacy, and the exploitation of the poor by the upper classes.


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[Assistant] Now when it was published in 1891, the plight of country girl Tess was viewed as outrageous, with the novel branded as scandalous. But this did nothing to discourage sales, making Hardy rather ironically wealthier than ever, while the rifts in his marriage grew deeper.


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[Assistant] If Tess of the D'Urberville scandalized Victorian society, what followed would shock them even more.


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[Assistant] When Jude the Obscure, the story of a disappointed village stonemason was published, there was a public outcry, and members of the clergy actually burnt the book as a protest over its subject matter.


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[Assistant] When Jude's young son hangs first his brother and sister and then himself, leaving a note saying, done because we are too many, people were horrified.


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[Assistant] Hardy was dismayed by the strength of feeling against him, and in fact, he slipped back into depression, and from this time onwards, poured all his creativity into his poetry, never writing another novel.


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[Assistant] On the domestic front at Maxgate, the novel was equally problematic, because Emma had developed an evangelical fervour and was horrified at what her husband had written. Handing Hardy a Bible, she promptly moved out of the marital bedroom and into the attic, which became her sanctuary.


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[Assistant] With the dawn of the 20th century. A new age dawn.


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[Assistant] And with the death of Queen Victoria in 1901.


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[Assistant] The world that Thomas Hardy had rebelled against began to change.


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[Assistant] As Hardy continued to publish wonderful poems, his novels became even more popular with a more liberated readership, and fans travelled to Dorset to see the dramatic locations immortalised in his great works. People wrote to Hardy from all over the world,


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[Assistant] And when a young teacher by the name of Florence Dugdale asked if she could visit him in 1905, a new chapter began for the now famous writer.


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[Assistant] A relationship developed between the unlikely pair, with Florence calling herself Hardy's secretary. But when the unhappy Emma died in 1912, Florence was keen to take her place. Emma Hardy was buried in Stinsford church


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[Assistant] Despite the difficulties experienced during 38 years of marriage, Hardy was overwhelmed by his memories.


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[Assistant] And the poems that followed commemorated the beautiful wild girl he had fallen in love with all those years earlier.


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[Assistant] Nevertheless, Thomas Hardy married Florence in the February of 1914, as the storm clouds of World War I gathered, and Hardy lived out his days at Maxgate, continuing to write his stunning poetry.


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[Assistant] And so we come full circle back to Stinsford Church where Jemima Hand first took a fancy to the musical Thomas Hardy Senior all those years earlier.


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[Assistant] But it's only the heart of our great author buried here in this grave. This is because his London friends believed Thomas Hardy should be buried in Westminster Abbey's Poets' Corner, and this is where the rest of his mortal remains were interned, alongside the great and the good of English literature.


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[Assistant] As a final note, it's worth mentioning that you can distinguish between the graves of Thomas Hardy Sr. and Jr. by the letters OM after our author's name.


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[Assistant] And for a man who all his life felt at a disadvantage because of his poor rural background, he achieved great things. And ironically, it was his memories of the salt of the earth farming folk.


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[Assistant] And the simple joys of country life that made his rise to fame and fortune possible.


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[Assistant] The tradition of the Great British Novel is as popular today as it's ever been.


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[Assistant] Since the first novelists put quill to parchment, the beautiful rural landscape has proved to be a major source of inspiration.


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[Assistant] Whether that happens to be the Hampshire countryside of Jane Austen, the Kent of Charles Dickens, the wild Yorkshire moors of the Bronte sisters, the Nottinghamshire of D.H. Lawrence, or the ancient Wessex of Thomas Hardy, each location speaks volumes. I'm Liam Dale.


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[Assistant] If you'd like to join me, I'd be delighted to introduce you to the Warwickshire of George Eliot.


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[Assistant] As birthplaces go, I must say South Farm is one of the loveliest I've ever seen. And in the very heart of the Warwickshire countryside, you just couldn't ask for a more idyllic location.


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[Assistant] It was here, on the 22nd of November 1819, that Mary Ann Evans, perhaps the most successful novelist of her generation, was born. If you're wondering why that name doesn't sound terribly familiar, it's probably because you know her much better by her nom de plume. George Eliot.


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[Assistant] The reason for so little changing here since the author responsible for such classics as The Mill on the Floss, Silas Marner, and Middlemarch was born is the fact that it's part of the Arbery estate, where traditional rural values are as respected today as they've ever been.


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[Assistant] South Farm by Custom is the home of the estate manager, and back in 1819, the position and the house were in the possession of Mr. Robert Evans, George Elliot's father.


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[Assistant] Although the Evans family and their new addition were only at South Farm for about four months, Arbery was to have a huge impact on George Eliot.


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[Assistant] Robert Evans continued to look after the estate for the Newgate family. And if you'd like to come with me the short distance to Arbery Hall, you'll see for yourself why the Big House made such a lasting impression.


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[Assistant] Welcome to Arbery Hall, the ancestral home of Viscount and Viscountess Daventry, where George Eliot, thanks to her father's high-ranking position in this household, was permitted to use the extensive library.


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[Assistant] Now even as a small girl, she was a voracious reader. And at the age of seven, was a fan of Sir Walter Scott's Waverley. Not to mention the works of Bunyan Defoe and Goldsmith.


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[Assistant] Although the hall is Elizabethan in origin, building work in the 18th century transformed it into one of the finest examples of gothic revival you're ever likely to see.


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[Assistant] And if we go inside, there are more Arbery treasures to reveal.


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[Assistant] One of the most striking features of this house has to be the soaring fan vaults with filigree tracery. Must have been truly mesmerizing for a small child.


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[Assistant] In one of George Eliot's less well-known works, Mr. Gil Phil's Love Story, from Scenes of Clerical Life, she describes carved ceilings that looked like petrified lacework in a house called Chevrolet Manor.


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[Assistant] I'm sure you'll agree with me when I say that there can be no doubt where she took her inspiration from.


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[Assistant] Nevertheless, Mary Ann Evans had a very long way to go before she wrote this delightful tale.


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[Assistant] And to discover more about George Eliot's own fascinating story, it's time to head to a nearby hostelry, which just happens to have been an equally important source of inspiration for George Eliot the writer as Arbery Hall, being the house that the Evans family moved to when she was still a babe in arms all those years ago.


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[Assistant] Now when Robert Evans brought his family here to live at Griff House, needless to say it wasn't a pub or even a hotel back then. And this is the place that George Eliot called home while she was growing up.


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[Assistant] Robert Evans had two children by his first wife, who had died in 1809, and two with his second wife, Christina, before she gave birth to Mary Ann in 1819.


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[Assistant] The closest in age to our future author was her brother Isaac, who she adored.


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[Assistant] And the pair spent many happy hours together in the countryside around Griff House and on the Arbery estate. And although George Eliot would become a city dweller as an adult, she would never forget her rural roots, which are at the very heart of her greatest novels.


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[Assistant] In fact, in The Mill on the Floss, the characters of Maggie Tulliver and her brother Tom are without question autobiographical, with Tom always scolding Maggie for her wayward behaviour, something that Isaac would take to the extreme in later years.


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[Assistant] We've now come right to the top of Griff House to discover a very special place. And I must confess to being really excited about being here.


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[Assistant] This attic, with its low beams, is the place where the burgeoning George Eliot loved best.


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[Assistant] Maggie stood motionless, except from her sobs for a minute or two.


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[Assistant] And she turned round and ran into the house and up to her attic where she sat on the floor and laid her head against the worm-eaten shelf with a crushing sense of memory. Tom was come home.


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[Assistant] She had thought how happy she should be. And now he was cruel to her.


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[Assistant] George Eliot actually based the doll-codes mill of her novel at St. Og's in Lincolnshire. But to see what she actually had in mind today, reading her evocative words, I hope you'll agree, child-cut fits the bill perfectly.


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[Assistant] Maggie loved to linger in the great spaces of the mill and often came out with her black hair pounded to a soft whiteness that made her dark eyes flash out with new fire.


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[Assistant] The fine white powder softening all surfaces and making the very spider nets look like fairy lacework.


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[Assistant] The sweet, pure scent of meal all helped to make Maggie feel that the mill was a little world apart from her outside, everyday life.


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[Assistant] The old country ways that have been so beautifully described in this novel paint a vivid picture of 19th century rural life.


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[Assistant] But there are those who view the work of George Eliot as rather serious.


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[Assistant] Yet her observations of the good country folk who would later become her cast of background characters add a wonderful touch of humour.


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[Assistant] Unlike her contemporary Charles Dickens, there's nothing sentimental in George Eliot's portrayal of either the people or the landscapes that inspired her.


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[Assistant] We do also get a glimpse of other members of her family through these characters, and again in The Mill on the Floss, when Mrs. Tulliver's sisters arrive, who we know are based on the sisters of Christina Evans, our author's aunts, the humour is evident.


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[Assistant] The well-to-do sisters are quick to voice their opinions, while deciding whether to buy teapots and table linen should there be a bankruptcy sale, as the Tullivors have fallen upon such hard times.


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[Assistant] Despite the tragic circumstances, their endearing bossiness is presented with wit and irony as they gather at the mill to dispense advice when Mr. Tulliver is sick and the family face ruin, and Sister Gleg is determined to be heard.


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[Assistant] For now though, we'll leave the ants at Charlecote Mill and return to Griff House to hear more about George Eliot's fascinating childhood.


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[Assistant] In The Mill on the Floss, Maggie is keen to be educated, but as was often the case in Victorian England, all the money was lavished on Tom as a boy, although Maggie is much brighter and would undoubtedly have made better use of the opportunity.


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[Assistant] However, this part of the tale is not autobiographical because Mary Ann Evans received a very good education and excelled in her studies until returning to Griff House at the age of 16 to help care for her dying mother.


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[Assistant] The harrowing experience had a huge impact on Mary Anne. She developed an obsessive religious fervour, studying church history and even teaching herself Latin.


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[Assistant] But other influences were about to transform this rather puritanical young lady into a passionate, worldly, wise woman way ahead of her time. And if you want to know more, you'll have to join me again in just a few minutes.


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[Assistant] Robert Evans retired from his duties at Arbery Hall, and as Isaac Evans was just about to marry, he remained at Griff House, keeping this lovely property in the family.


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[Assistant] Mary Anne and her father moved to nearby Coventry, and for Robert and Isaac, this was when the hitherto biddable Miss Evans started to become troublesome, flexing her intellectual muscle, having made new friends who were radical thinkers.


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[Assistant] While Isaac remained the respectable countryman here at Griff, the reactionary Mary Anne turned her back on religion.


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[Assistant] And began to follow where her heart and mind led her. When Robert Evans died in 1849, she actually asked,


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[Assistant] And it wasn't long before Mary Ann's excellent education and early writing skills threw her into the path of temptation.


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[Assistant] As this evidently passionate, courageous young woman found her own way of coping with the restraints of Victorian society.


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[Assistant] Actually, Robert Evans would have turned in his grave, well, to be more accurate, in the family tomb here, at Chilvers Coton Churchyard, if he could have seen his daughter's headstrong ways. And even Brother Isaac could do nothing to keep his sister in check once she'd moved to London.


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[Assistant] This all came about because while she was still living in Coventry, she'd taken over a translation project for one of her radical friends who was struggling with the task.


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[Assistant] He sought out its translator, and shortening her name to Marion, Ms Evans moved to Chapman's boarding house at 142 The Strand, where she began her literary career.


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[Assistant] Although we can only speculate, it would seem that the dashingly handsome Chapman took more than a professional interest in his young lodger. She apparently was not averse to his attentions.


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[Assistant] It was already an unusual household, and when Chapman's wife and his mistress, who also lived in the house, joined forces to have Marion removed, she was quite literally sent to Coventry, back home to Warwickshire.


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[Assistant] The exile was short-lived though, as Chapman bought the Westminster Review, a journal for philosophical radicals, and Marion was promptly restored to her position in the House on the Strand to run the publication.


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[Assistant] Undaunted in her quest to find love, and at the very heart of literary society, Marion soon developed a relationship with Herbert Spencer, the editor of The Economist.


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[Assistant] Sadly for her though, he described her as too morbidly intellectual to marry.


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[Assistant] Marion's infatuation with Spencer was only quelled when he introduced her to his friend George Henry Lewis, a fellow philosopher and writer.


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[Assistant] The pair quickly fell in love and Spencer happily remained a confirmed bachelor for the rest of his days. But there was a problem.


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[Assistant] George Lewis was married, albeit an unusual open relationship. His wife Agnes had given him three sons, but had also had further children with another man.


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[Assistant] Who Lewis had given his name to, making a divorce all but impossible, as he'd been seen to condone his wife's infidelity.


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[Assistant] As a result, Marion also took the Lewis name, and the couple lived together as man and wife, but at a distance from even the more liberal-minded literary circle that they both moved in.


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[Assistant] It was at this point that Marion, with the encouragement of Lewis, turned her attention to novel writing, choosing George Eliot as a masculine pen name, not only to court publishing success, but also perhaps to disguise her somewhat dubious marital status.


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[Assistant] Nevertheless, it was not the elite intellectuals of London society that Marion turned to for inspiration. It was the beautiful Warwickshire countryside of her childhood.


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[Assistant] And if you come with me now to the lovely church of Saint Mary the Virgin in the village of Astley, you'll certainly understand why.


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[Assistant] George Elliot's first success as a storyteller came with the publication of her Scenes of Clerical Life in Blackwood's magazine.


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[Assistant] This church appears as Nebly Church and is actually where her parents were married.


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[Assistant] The reviews were excellent when her scenes of clerical life were published in book form.


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[Assistant] And encouraged, she began work on Adam Bede, which received even greater acclaim.


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[Assistant] Queen Victoria and Prince Albert were said to have enjoyed the novel greatly, adding to George Eliot's growing popularity.


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[Assistant] However, drawing on childhood memories like this beautiful church, there was one person who was quick to identify George Elliot, and that was of course Marion's brother, Isaac.


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[Assistant] The Evans family was scandalized by Marion's relationship with George Lewis and shunned her completely, making it impossible for her to even visit the places that had now made her so famous.


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[Assistant] Yet for the world of literature, this was one cloud that very definitely had a silver lining.


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[Assistant] And as we return to Charlecutte Mill, all will be revealed.


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[Assistant] Without a doubt, the most influential person in Marion's childhood had been her brother Isaac. With her identity no longer a secret, in her next novel, The Mill on the Floss, she was now free to write about this complex relationship.


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[Assistant] The hugely autobiographical work was another success, critically and financially, and Mr. and Mrs. Lewis moved up in the world.


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[Assistant] London, they were no longer social outcasts, and Marion moved into a new phase of her writing career.


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[Assistant] It was as if she had exorcised her demons. And when Silas Marner was published in 1861, her readers discovered a much gentler side to George Eliot, when the miserly weaver of Ravelot discovers that love is far greater than riches when it comes to finding happiness.


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[Assistant] Despite a brief defection to a new publisher with the unsuccessful Romula, a historic tale of Italy which Blackwood had felt would not be well received, George Eliot returned to Matters English and the astute Blackwood with the novel Felix Holt in 1830.


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[Assistant] Even so, it failed to capture the public imagination.


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[Assistant] Her readers were mesmerized by the goings on in the town being transformed by the Industrial Revolution, based on the author's memories of Coventry, and they eagerly waited for her next novel, her last, Daniel de Ronda, in 1876.


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[Assistant] It was a brave work, discrediting anti-Semitism, but was not as popular with the Victorians as Middlemarch had been.


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[Assistant] But as memories of her Warwickshire past still coloured George Eliot's literary offerings, London life for Marion in the grand Regent's Park house she now shared with her beloved Lewis suddenly changed dramatically.


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[Assistant] Marion was devastated, and when he was buried in the Highgate Cemetery, she was too overcome with grief to attend his funeral.


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[Assistant] Nevertheless, as she recovered, she started to become close to her financial advisor, John Cross, who she and Lewis had always referred to as Nephew Johnny.


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[Assistant] He was 20 years her junior, but evidently saw something that appealed to him in The 60 Year Old Author, because they were married in 1880.


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[Assistant] And in December moved into the very stylish Four Chaney Walk in Chelsea.


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[Assistant] We do have one clue, however, to the mysterious allure of George Eliot, as after the young American writer Henry James had met her, he described her in a way that she may not altogether have seen as a compliment.


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[Assistant] To begin with, she is magnificently ugly, deliciously hideous.


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[Assistant] Now, in this vast ugliness, there is a powerful beauty, so that you end as I ended, falling in love with this great horse-faced blue stocking.


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[Assistant] Sadly though, the new and now respectfully married Mrs. Cross was not destined to find happiness with her new husband at Chaney Walk.


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[Assistant] falling ill with laryngitis soon after moving in and her condition deteriorated rapidly. She died very suddenly.


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[Assistant] On the 22nd of December 1880, with John Cross at her side.


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[Assistant] Although he tried to have his famous wife buried in Westminster Abbey's Poets Corner, the religious establishment turned the mortal remains of George Eliot away because of her relationship with George Lewis.


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[Assistant] She was instead buried next to the man she had considered her husband, even though the church did not for so many years, in Highgate Cemetery.


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[Assistant] Ironically, one of the mourners at her funeral was none other than Isaac Evans, who had become reconciled with his sister after her marriage to John Cross.


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[Assistant] And it's sad that George Eliot did not live long enough to return home to Warwickshire to revisit the places that inspired her to become one of literature's greatest novelists.


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[Assistant] But it's not in London that we should bid farewell to this extraordinary woman who was so far ahead of her time.


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[Assistant] The only proper place we should take our leave is back once more in the heart of George Eliot country, as she said herself in middlemarch.


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[Assistant] Proving beyond all doubt that despite so often being mistaken for a man, George Eliot was indeed a woman of vision, sustained her whole life long by memories of this remarkable landscape.


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[Assistant] There's something truly remarkable about the British rural landscape.


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[Assistant] And if you turn to the pages of classic literature, you'll find many examples that prove this to be the case. Whether Jane Austen's Hampshire, Charles Dickens' Kent, Lebronte's sister's Yorkshire, Thomas Hardy's Wessex, or George Eliot's Warwickshire.


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[Assistant] The Great British countryside plays a starring role. I'm Liam Dale, and if you'd like to see for yourself,


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[Assistant] Join me as I reveal the Nottinghamshire of D.H. Lawrence.


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[Assistant] For most people, just the mention of DH Lawrence carries with it a whiff of scandal.


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[Assistant] Especially if his infamous novel Lady Chatterley's Lover is part of the conversation.


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[Assistant] But this truly great British author, who was never fully appreciated in his own lifetime, wrote about a landscape that he described as the country of his heart, and it all started here in Eastwood, on the outskirts of Nottingham.


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[Assistant] This is the D.H. Lawrence Birthplace Museum at 8A Victoria Street, and it's been carefully restored and refurbished to reflect the age into which our author was born.


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[Assistant] Today, it certainly has a Victorian charm. But realistically, when David Herbert Richards Lawrence was born in the front bedroom on the 11th of September 1885, life in this miner's terrace was anything but rural and far from idyllic.


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[Assistant] As childhoods go, young Bert Lawrence, as he was always known, had a pretty tough time.


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[Assistant] His mother Lydia considered herself a lady and had married his father Arthur, a gregarious but poor miner, to escape her family's genteel poverty, believing him to be much better off than he was. By the time she realized the truth, it was too late and the mismatched couple fought bitterly.


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[Assistant] Provide the inspiration for the warring morals in Lawrence's autobiographical Sons and Lovers.


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[Assistant] Arthur Lawrence worked here at Brinsley Pit, spending his life underground, along with the majority of the men in the district. They had to be tough to survive, and for the refined Lydia, his rough manners and tendency to spend his few hours above ground and his wages in the pub caused violent rouse.


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[Assistant] Bert was their fourth child, arriving after George, Ernest and Emily, and was quickly followed by another daughter, Ada.


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[Assistant] All of the children took their mother's side, turning against their father. And when Lawrence remembered Arthur in later life, his words were chilling.


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[Assistant] I was born hating my father. As early as ever I can remember, I shivered with horror when he touched me.


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[Assistant] It's hard to imagine what it must have been like living in this tiny house with four children plus another on the way and two adults who were constantly fighting.


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[Assistant] Eventually, a move was inevitable, but it was to an area known as The Breach, renamed as The Bottoms, in Sons and Lovers. Although, Garden Road today looks perfectly pleasant. When the Lawrences moved here in 1887, the kitchen opened onto a back alley where the dust and stench from the ash pits pervaded the air.


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[Assistant] By this stage, Lydia knew there was no escaping the hard life she had married into, but there was a chance for her children, and she was intelligent enough to realize that for her boys to avoid going down the pit, they needed an education.


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[Assistant] At the age of three, young Bert Lawrence joined his older brothers at Bovale School, Greasley, and it was far from being a happy experience.


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[Assistant] Always a sickly child, he was too frail to take part in games and often stayed at home with his mother, which resulted in him being teased and bullied.


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[Assistant] But Bert was a clever boy, and when he was 12 and a half, he won a scholarship to Nottingham High School.


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[Assistant] The council was sponsoring poorer children, covering part of the cost, but Lydia still had to find the money to make up the difference.


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[Assistant] Even so, she must have been delighted at her son's success, although the stigma of being a scholarship boy resulted in him being shunned by his classmates.


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[Assistant] Lawrence's sense of not belonging was heightened. Like his mother, he'd been educated above the community he lived in, while that very background prevented him from being accepted in the middle-class environment of the high school.


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[Assistant] To begin with though, the boy from The Breach did well, even winning prizes. But when a family scandal hit the headlines, Bert's schoolwork went into a sudden decline.


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[Assistant] Arthur Lawrence's brother, Walter, had been tried for killing his 15-year-old son in a drunken accident and the newspapers exposed the whole sordid story.


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[Assistant] It marked the end of Lawrence's time at the high school as he left that summer and never returned.


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[Assistant] While Bert had been struggling at school, his older brother Ernest had been bringing a good wage home to his mother, and he'd become the apple of her eye.


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[Assistant] Ernest was employed in an office, thanks to his clerical skills, earning him not only a good living, but also a rise to the middle classes, and Lydia's prayers for a better life for her children had been answered.


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[Assistant] Lydia must have been overjoyed when some years later, Ernest got a position in a London solicitor's office, and when he returned to visit, in his top hat, frock coat and kid gloves, he was every bit the gentleman.


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[Assistant] However, tragedy struck when Ernest went back to London as he fell ill with an inflammatory disease and died.


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[Assistant] Lydia rushed to his bedside, but it was too late. All she could do was bring her beloved son's body back to Eastwood for burial.


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[Assistant] For Lawrence, the loss of his brother coupled with his mother's overwhelming grief made this a very dark chapter in his life. He took a job in a factory to help with the household income.


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[Assistant] The family had long since moved from The Breach to Walker Street, and it was here that the troubled young man fell gravely ill.


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[Assistant] In her pleasant bay-windowed home, Lydia was suddenly jolted out of her grief for Ernest by her concern for Bert, and she nursed him so attentively that the bond between them became almost oppressive.


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[Assistant] In fact, in later years, Lawrence acknowledged that his relationship with his mother was beyond the normal boundaries for parent and child.


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[Assistant] So sensitive to each other that we never needed words.


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[Assistant] It has been rather terrible and has made me in some respects abnormal.


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[Assistant] Just a short distance from the coal dust-covered confines of Eastwood lay the beautiful Nottinghamshire countryside, and a new chapter opened in the life of D.H. Lawrence.


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[Assistant] Lydia set great store by religion and attended the nearby congregational chapel, and it was here that she met Anne Chambers. So when her new friend moved to Hagg's Farm near Underwood, the Lawrence's were invited for a visit.


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[Assistant] The impression the countryside made on Lawrence was phenomenal.


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[Assistant] And that first walk he took from his home to Hagg's farm with his mother has been immortalised in sons and lovers.


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[Assistant] The mother and son went through the wheat and oats over a little bridge into a wild meadow. Pea wheats with their white breasts glistening wheeled and screamed about them.


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[Assistant] But it wasn't just the landscape that appealed to Lawrence. The boisterous Chambers family took him to their hearts. He became firm friends with the Chambers brothers and developed a relationship with their sister Jessie that would inspire him to create the character of Miriam Leavers in Sons and Lovers.


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[Assistant] Although at first, their friendship was perfectly acceptable. By the time Lawrence was 20, his family gave him an ultimatum.


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[Assistant] Either become engaged to Jessie or leave her alone. With his whole life ahead of him.


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[Assistant] And knowing he was not in love with Jessie, he decided upon the latter option.


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[Assistant] But Jesse was terribly upset when he told her of his decision as she had fallen head over heels in love with Lawrence.


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[Assistant] Leaving Jesse and Hags Farm behind him, Lawrence again trying to make his way in education, winning a place at Nottingham University College, studying to become a teacher.


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[Assistant] When he arrived, he was full of hope and great expectations, and in his novel, The Rainbow, his heroine, Ursula Brangwyn's first impressions of attending university were without doubt his own.


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[Assistant] But the magic soon wore off, and the university was subject to an angry attack by Lawrence with these words.


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[Assistant] Yet his memories of this beautiful countryside were never far from his thoughts, and although Lawrence was prone to bouts of sudden fierce anger, while studying in Nottingham, he discovered a way to channel his furious energy.


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[Assistant] But if you want to know what he did to dampen the burning flames of rage, you'll have to join me again in just a few moments.


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[Assistant] While the other students scribbled their notes during lectures, Lawrence allowed his mind to drift back here as he started writing his first novel, The White Peacock.


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[Assistant] It recreated the golden days at Hagg's farm, and although he wasn't allowed to see Jessie Chambers alone, he did get the pages of his manuscript to her, and her comments proved invaluable.


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[Assistant] Despite Lawrence's disappointment with his university experience, he did very well indeed. And when his studies were complete, he found a position as an assistant schoolmaster in London.


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[Assistant] It was an incredible achievement for the minor son born here in Eastwood, but as Lawrence battled to tame his students, who he described as wild beasts in the daytime, it was memories of Nottinghamshire he returned to in the evening as he worked on the white peacock.


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[Assistant] At a distance, Jessie remained a faithful friend to Lawrence, offering encouragement, and she would prove to be instrumental in promoting his literary career.


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[Assistant] As Lawrence settled to city life, visiting theatres, museums, and soaking up the cultural atmosphere, the novelist and editor Ford Maddox Ford had founded a journal called The English Review.


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[Assistant] The works of such luminaries as Thomas Hardy and H.G. Wells had been published in the review.


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[Assistant] Not only did Lawrence get his poems published, but also Ford believed the young man had genius and suggested he send the white peacock to Heinemann.


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[Assistant] When the publisher accepted the manuscript immediately, paying the not inconsiderable sum of £50, Lawrence was set fair for a glittering literary career.


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[Assistant] Undoubtedly, Jesse Chambers and the whole hags farm experience had been key to this early success.


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[Assistant] But when he returned to Nottinghamshire for visits, the pair became closer, and Lawrence sought a physical relationship with the girl he'd not been prepared to marry. It proved to be disastrous for both of them, and a few months later, Lawrence finished the affair.


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[Assistant] However, events at home were about to overshadow any discomfort Lawrence might have felt about Jessie, because just two weeks after the breakup, Lydia Lawrence was diagnosed with cancer.


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[Assistant] These were desperate days for Lawrence, but he found comfort in the arms of an old friend from teacher training days, Louis Burroughs, who came from the lovely village of Costle.


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[Assistant] Louis' family home was Church Cottage, next to the lovely church, and at this terrible time for Lawrence, the place must have had quite an impact on our author.


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[Assistant] It would play a huge part in perhaps his greatest novel, The Rainbow, but for the time being all his thoughts were focused on Lydia. In fact, although Lawrence proposed to Louis and she accepted him, he never told his mother of the engagement, fearing that it would upset her.


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[Assistant] But within days of the proposal, Lydia died and was buried with her son Ernest in Eastwood Cemetery.


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[Assistant] It was December 1910, and as the year came to an end, Lawrence returned to his post in London.


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[Assistant] And as he continued to teach, he poured his troubled thoughts into his autobiographical Sons and Lovers.


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[Assistant] Isolated and depressed, Lawrence had serious doubts about his engagement to Louis, but at that time, fell ill with pneumonia.


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[Assistant] The illness meant the end of Lawrence's teaching career, and when he recovered, he called off the wedding.


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[Assistant] As we return to the house Lawrence drew so much inspiration from for sons and lovers, we enter another key period in our author's life.


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[Assistant] His first draft of the novel was never completed, no doubt due to his mother's death.


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[Assistant] But after giving up teaching, he resumed work on the novel, as events led Lawrence in a very different direction.


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[Assistant] As he had German cousins, a plan was proposed for him to go and visit them.


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[Assistant] Remembering his old German professor, Ernest Wheatley, Lawrence decided to go to Nottingham to ask his advice. When Lawrence arrived, Wheatley was not at home.


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[Assistant] But his wife Frieda was happy to entertain her husband's guest.


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[Assistant] There was an instant connection between the unlikely pair and within minutes they were deep in conversation.


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[Assistant] Frieda was German by birth, totally uninhibited, and Lawrence was instantly captivated.


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[Assistant] Frieda quickly became the love of Lawrence's life as they embarked upon a wild and passionate affair, often meeting in the countryside around Eastwood.


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[Assistant] Eventually, they decided to travel to Germany together and Lawrence was introduced to Frieda's family. Her father, a baron and a military gentleman was horrified and described his daughter's lover as an ill-bred, common, penniless lout.


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[Assistant] But Frida was bizotted and refused to give him up. Weekly was informed by Telegram of his wife's affair.


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[Assistant] While Frieda battled for custody of her children, Lawrence was hoping that having sons and lovers published would provide him and Frieda with an income.


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[Assistant] But Lawrence had been very explicit in every respect with his autobiographical writing, and the manuscript was rejected for being too shocking.


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[Assistant] Nevertheless, he and Fried had continued with their great adventure, traveling to Italy, as Lawrence reworked his novel, which was eventually accepted for publication in 1913.


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[Assistant] Frieda and Lawrence returned to England for his sister Ada's wedding, and in 1914, shortly before the outbreak of World War I, Frieda's divorce came through and the couple were married.


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[Assistant] Some sense of normality had been restored, and Lawrence's literary career was now prospering, but when war was declared within weeks of their marriage, it heralded yet more trouble for the new U.S.


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[Assistant] When Lawrence's latest manuscript, The Wedding Ring, was presented, he was asked to submit again in six months, when it was believed that the war would be over, but all hopes of the conflict being resolved quickly were soon dashed. This left the Lawrence's infinite


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[Assistant] They couldn't return to Europe, and anti-German feeling was rising in Britain. And of course, Friede was German, and worse still, the cousin of the Red Baron, the German fighter pilot responsible for so many British deaths.


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[Assistant] Moving around the country from place to place, struggling to make ends meet, Lawrence remembered the lovely village of Kossel as he transformed the wedding ring into two sequential novels, The Rainbow and Women in Love.


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[Assistant] In The Rainbow, Kossel becomes Kosithae, where his epic family saga of the Brangwins unfolds generation by generation.


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[Assistant] However, when it was published in 1915, there was a public outcry at the explicit sexual nature of sections of the novel, and it was removed from the shelves under the Obscene Publications Act of 1857.


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[Assistant] Lawrence's reputation lay in tatters, but as the new year of 1916 was rung in, the couple were offered a holiday house on the Cornish coast, and for Lawrence it was the perfect place to retreat from the public gaze.


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[Assistant] By spring, as the colourful flowers started to bloom, the Laurences had found two cottages to rent at Zenner, and while preparations were made, they stayed at the village pub, the Tinner's Arms.


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[Assistant] When Lawrence was in Zenner, he wrote to a friend and he said,


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[Assistant] It is all gorse now, flickering with flowers.


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[Assistant] But the Lawrence's were far from being a typical couple, and the local people did not take to their exotic neighbours.


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[Assistant] The vicar at Zenner so disapproved of the scandalous pair, he made sure the authorities investigated them as spies, which wasn't difficult because of Frieda's nationality.


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[Assistant] Eventually, they were expelled from Cornwall and had no choice but to return to London, where the police continued to hound them.


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[Assistant] As soon as the war ended in 1918, the Lawrence's were able to leave Britain and set off on what our author described as his savage pilgrimage, traveling the world far and wide to find a place to call home.


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[Assistant] However, it was this beautiful Nottinghamshire countryside that continued to inspire our author. While in Florence, in 1927, he wrote his best-known novel, Lady Chatterley's Lover, which would cause even more controversy than The Rainbow and Women in Love.


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[Assistant] But Lawrence's health was failing fast. One of his last poems, written about a blue gentian flower, suggests that he knew full well that his days were numbered.


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[Assistant] This statue with a blue gentian cut poignantly in his hands is a fitting memorial and can be found at Nottingham University.


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[Assistant] Yet it is the Nottinghamshire countryside that D.H. Lawrence describes so vividly in his novels that best sums up the brilliance of this creative and passionate man who the world simply wasn't ready for when he walked these paths and told his tales so many years ago.


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[Assistant] When you look a little more closely at the novels of the wonderful British authors who've done so much to make literature great, you'll find a portrait of rural Britain as vividly drawn as any well-written character. Whether the Kent of Charles Dickens, George Eliot's Warwickshire, D.H. Lawrence's Nottinghamshire, the Brontë sisters' Yorkshire, or Thomas Hardy's Wessex, there are so many wonderful places to explore.


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[Assistant] And Jane Austen's Hampshire is no exception, as you're about to discover.


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[Assistant] If I tell you that for many people where I'm now standing is considered to be nothing short of hallowed ground, you might think I've just spent a few hours in the pub.


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[Assistant] Granted, you see before you a classic example of a fine rural landscape, but it is, when all's said and done, a field, albeit a very lovely one.


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[Assistant] There is nonetheless a very good reason for bringing you here. Because on this spot, more than two centuries ago, a parsonage once stood. Where on the 16th of December 1775, a little later than expected, one of the greatest writers of all time was born.


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[Assistant] The lady in question, for that is undoubtedly the correct way to address her, despite her humble origins, was none other than Jane Austen, the author of Pride and Prejudice, and the creator of literature's favourite couple, the dashingly handsome Mr Darcy, and the truly delectable Elizabeth Bennet.


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[Assistant] Although there's not a lot to see in Home Meadow as the field is now known, with the old rectory having been demolished in the 1820s, inside this clump of stinging nettles you can still find the remnants of the well and old pump that would have served the wash house in Jane Austen's time.


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[Assistant] Also, the slope here, we have it on good authority, was one Jane used to enjoy rolling down as a child, in case you're wondering just who that authority might have been.


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[Assistant] It's none other than the great lady herself, having written about Catherine Moreland, a charmingly spirited heroine from Northanger Abbey, doing the exact same thing.


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[Assistant] But I would just like to point out this stunning lime tree which was planted in 1813 by Jane's older brother, James.


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[Assistant] But before we make the acquaintance of the rest of the Austin family, we'll take a stroll along the lane to find the delightful church of Saint Nicholas, which is such an integral part of the Jane Austen story.


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[Assistant] From the moment you arrive at the church, you can't fail to notice Miss Austin's presence, because it was here that her father, the Reverend George Austin, served as rector throughout her childhood and youthful years.


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[Assistant] In fact, Jane's brothers James and Henry were subsequent rectors of Steventon, as was her nephew William Knight, resulting in a family tradition that spanned an incredible, uninterrupted 114 years.


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[Assistant] The Reverend George Austin was a scholarly man who'd been proctor of St. John's College Oxford, who, described as handsome, made an advantageous marriage to Cassandra Lee, the niece of the Master of Balliol College.


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[Assistant] So if you've ever asked yourself why there are so many clergymen in Jane Austen's novels, you now have the answer. Because as you see, the church was the very foundation of the world in which she lived.


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[Assistant] By the time the Reverend George moved to Steventon Rectory, he and his wife already had three sons, James, George, and Edward. And once here, they were quickly followed by Henry, and then the first Austin girl, Jane's beloved sister, Cassandra.


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[Assistant] Brother Frank arrived before Jane's birth in 1775. And last but not least, came brother Charles to complete the family.


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[Assistant] And when you consider that the Reverend Austin also took in students who lived with the family, they must have on occasion have filled this lovely little church.


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[Assistant] She was already extremely well read, especially when it came to novels.


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[Assistant] Also, as Jane grew into a fine-looking young lady, she, along with her sister Cassandra, had certainly attracted the attention of the young men in the district, if the words of their cousin Eliza are to be believed when she described them as two of the prettiest girls in England.


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[Assistant] It was at this time that Jane started to experiment with novel writing and her experiences at assemblies and balls held locally along with social events when visiting relations all helped to provide the blossoming author with a wealth of romantic material.


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[Assistant] In 1795, Jane actually attempted a novel of her own, Eleanor and Marianne.


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[Assistant] And if the names sound familiar, it's because they would evolve to become the Dashwood Sisters of sense and sensibility fame.


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[Assistant] A year later, she wrote First Impressions, which so impressed the Reverend George Austin, he sent his daughter's handiwork to a publisher.


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[Assistant] Sadly, his enthusiasm was not shared by the recipient who turned it down flat, but as it would reappear as pride and prejudice some years later, such fatherly approval was certainly justified.


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[Assistant] Another early work that would also be retitled was Susan, written in 1798, and this version of what would later become Northanger Abbey focused on a young country girl's introduction to the fashionable society of Bath.


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[Assistant] This beautiful city, often associated with Jane Austen provided much inspiration.


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[Assistant] However, it can come as something of a surprise to discover that Jane actually disliked Bath. Although in fairness, this was not altogether the fault of the city.


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[Assistant] All Jane's progress as an author seemed to come to an abrupt halt. Work on a novel called The Watsons was abandoned, and despite selling the manuscript of Susan for £10, it never appeared in print.


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[Assistant] The financial constraints on the Austins made life harder than it had ever been at Steventon. And without the advantage of homegrown produce and livestock, these were far from happy times. And matters very suddenly went from bad to worse.


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[Assistant] When the Reverend George Austin died in January 1805 of an illness he appeared to be recovering from, Bath was forever associated with unhappiness for Jane.


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[Assistant] As the Austin ladies were left almost destitute, the future looked decidedly bleak.


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[Assistant] But during her bath years, Jane did enjoy one great advantage. Because summers in the city were hot and stuffy, there would be seaside visits that provided her with experiences she would never forget. And thanks to her wonderful writing, there are experiences we can all share.


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[Assistant] I'm here at Lyme Regis, walking on the Cobb, immortalized by Jane in her final novel, Persuasion, where her deliciously drawn character, Louisa Musgrove, takes a near fatal tumble.


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[Assistant] Actually, Jane Austen devotees will tell you that this is the most exciting attribute of this particular lady, and it is without doubt only because of this remarkable place that she so often remembered.


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[Assistant] Even the great Victorian romantic poet Alfred Lord Tennyson, when visiting Lyne, cried out at his guide, Don't talk to me of the Duke of Monmouth, show me the steps from which Louisa Musgrove fell.


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[Assistant] Proving beyond all doubt just how evocative Jane Austen's description of the event truly was.


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[Assistant] There was too much wind to make the high part of the New Cob pleasant for the ladies, and they agreed to get down the steps to the lower, and all were contented to pass quietly and carefully down the steep flight, excepting Louisa.


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[Assistant] She must be jumped down them by Captain Wentworth.


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[Assistant] Of course, we all know exactly what is about to happen, and we are not disappointed.


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[Assistant] And if you want to know what happens next to poor headstrong Louisa, you'll have to join me again in just a few moments.


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[Assistant] The news I can report for Louisa Musgrove is good. The rival for the heart and hand of Captain Wentworth, the true love of Persuasion's timid heroine Anne Elliot, Louisa, is granted her survival.


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[Assistant] But in classic Austin style, she learns the error of her wild ways, leaves Captain Wentworth to the deserving Anne, and becomes engaged to a fine fellow, more suited to her reformed character.


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[Assistant] But what, I hear you ask, of Jane? Well, we know that things must have started to look up for the destitute Austin ladies. After all, there are six fabulous novels still in print to this day. And if you'd like to discover where they were written, we need to return to Hampshire and the picturesque village of Choughton.


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[Assistant] When you arrive at Choughton, you'll be left in no doubt as to who once lived here. And there's no better place for us to begin than at Jane Austen House.


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[Assistant] Now as much a living memorial to the lady in question as it is a museum, Jane moved into Choughton Cottage in 1809.


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[Assistant] And in this letter to her brother Frank expresses perfectly her hopes and her fears.


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[Assistant] This improvement in fortunes for Jane came as a direct result of her brother Edward's rise to prominence as a wealthy gentleman.


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[Assistant] Having been adopted as the heir of Thomas Knight, Edward had a number of estates at his disposal, one of which was Choughton, and while he could have occupied the nearby great house, he was able to provide Choughton Cottage for his mother and sisters.


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[Assistant] Today, you'll find many of Jane's personal items here at Choughton. A lock of her hair, still with a glimmer of auburn.


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[Assistant] The Topaz crosses given by Brother Charles to Jane and Cassandra.


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[Assistant] And even the bookcase that belonged to the Reverend George Austin, previously having graced the old rectory at Steventon.


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[Assistant] But Pride of Place quite rightly goes to Jane's elegant little writing table where all of her novels were either revised or written.


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[Assistant] Here, at the heart of a charming domestic scene, Jane composed her famous tales of love, marriage, wealth and power, while her mother happily tended the garden and Cassandra sat at her sewing or drawing.


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[Assistant] All of Jane's works were published anonymously during her lifetime and only her closest family and friends knew of her success.


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[Assistant] Which would have made attending all the society balls and assemblies that would once have entertained her all the harder to bear.


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[Assistant] In no time at all, accepting her lot in life, Jane set to work, transforming Eleanor and Marianne into sense and sensibility, turning to her memories of the Devon coast as a setting for her tale.


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[Assistant] Bright, light, sparkling and full of wit and wisdom, the opening lines serve notice that this is an author with a story worth the telling.


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[Assistant] Later, when Jane was asked for advice on novel writing by her niece Anna, she explained that three or four families in a country village is the very thing to work on.


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[Assistant] And with the phenomenal success of Pride and Prejudice that does this very thing it was evidently advice that was well worth taking. And you only have to take a walk around Choughton


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[Assistant] Wander amongst the graves at the churchyard where both Mrs. Austin and Cassandra's can be found to see where so much of her inspiration came from building on her earlier experiences at Steventon when the ideas for both sense and sensibility and pride and prejudice had first taken shape.


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[Assistant] Following the same formula, next came Mansfield Park, Emma, and Persuasion, but with heroines as diverse as anyone could ask, from the terribly wholesome and good Fanny Price, to the meddlesome, opinionated Emma Woodhouse, and the shy Anne Elliot, who we've already met.


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[Assistant] And all the while, the beautiful English countryside and ever-changing rural landscape continued to provide the perfect backdrop for Jane's alluring ladies and handsome gentlemen.


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[Assistant] But if you've been quickly totting that lot up and wondering what happens to the sixth novel, ironically, it's Northanger Abbey.


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[Assistant] Published posthumously with persuasion, this was the retitled Susan, which had been wrestled back from the tardy publisher who'd bought it for £10, the first piece of writing Jane Austen ever sold.


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[Assistant] But there was to be no happy ending for Jane. No Mr Darcy or Captain Wentworth to whisk her away when all hope of romance was gone.


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[Assistant] Jane Fellil while working on Persuasion.


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[Assistant] And although it's now believed she was probably suffering from Addison's disease, there was nothing known of the condition or how to treat it back in the early 1800s.


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[Assistant] From struggling to walk and even ride in the donkey carriage that's been so lovingly restored here at Choughton, Jane was taken to Winchester for the best medical care available.


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[Assistant] In these lodgings, caressed by the shadow of the cathedral, Cassandra nursed her sister until on the 18th of July, 1817, at the age of 41, Jane died in Cassandra's arms.


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[Assistant] This was a fine epitaph from Cassandra, and if you walk the short distance from College Street to the Cathedral and step inside, you'll find the simple memorial stone, a slab on the floor of the North Isle of the Knave where our First Lady of Literature was finally laid to rest.


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[Assistant] I've actually been allowed to sit here at Jane's writing table and I have in my hands her very own first edition of Sense and Sensibility. Wonderful. Can you imagine the parcel arriving all wrapped up in brown paper and string?


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[Assistant] I've chosen my favourite extract to finish with, naturally, out in the countryside when a pleasant stroll has gone horribly wrong.


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[Assistant] Poor Marianne Dashwood has stumbled on the hillside, and out of the mist and rain, a hero comes to her rescue. I do hope that Jane would have approved of my choice.


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[Assistant] A gentleman carrying a gun with two pointers playing round him was passing up the hill and within a few yards of Marianne when her accident happened.


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[Assistant] But her foot had been twisted in the fall and she was scarcely able to stand.


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[Assistant] The gentleman offered his services and perceiving that her modesty declined what her situation rendered necessary, took her up in his arms without further delay and carried her down the hill.


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[Assistant] I do hope you've enjoyed this journey through Jane Austen's Hampshire. I never tire of visiting this beautiful countryside. But if you'd like to continue this exploration of rural Britain, join me next time.


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[Assistant] Discovering another of the nation's finest landscapes responsible for inspiring more of literature's best-loved classics.


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[Assistant] To travel around Britain in search of the rural landscapes that have inspired great writers to put Quill to parchment will reveal some truly beautiful locations.


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[Assistant] From Thomas Hardy's Wessex to Jane Austen's Hampshire, George Eliot's Warwickshire, Lebronte's sister's Yorkshire and D.H. Lawrence's Nottinghamshire.


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[Assistant] My name is Liam Dale and I'd be delighted to escort you back in time in this program to follow in the footsteps of Charles Dickens, one of literature's most esteemed heroes.


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[Assistant] Welcome to Gadshill Place, the much-loved home of Charles Dickens, the house that as an impressionable child he'd vowed to own one day.


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[Assistant] This truly is a rags to riches tale to rival anything the great man ever penned. And although it may seem rather strange to begin our journey where Charles Dickens died, rather than where he was born, Gads Hill played such a significant role in our author's story, which makes it a great place to start.


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[Assistant] The setting is beautiful. The Kent countryside at its magnificent best, close to the historic town of Rochester.


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[Assistant] It was a landscape that would influence Charles Dickens his whole life long, and he spent much of his childhood in this district, while his father John was employed as a clerk in the Navy pay office based at Chatham, one of the neighbouring Medway towns of South East England.


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[Assistant] And it was while out walking with his father as a child that Charles Dickens first encountered Gads Hill Place.


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[Assistant] John Dickens, as you'll discover a little later, may not have been the ideal father, but he did tell his young son, as they stood gazing upon this magnificent house, that if he worked really hard and never lost sight of his dream, Gadshill Place could become his home.


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[Assistant] In fact, the reason why we are so sure that this incident really did take place is because it was a story that Charles Dickens often recounted, and it actually found its way into print many years later in The Uncommercial Traveler, where you'll find these familiar words.


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[Assistant] Ever since I can recollect, my father, seeing me so fond of it, has often said to me


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[Assistant] If you were to be very persevering and were to work hard, you might someday come to live in it.


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[Assistant] It's not difficult to appreciate how this charming piece of fatherly advice motivated Charles Dickens when he began to make his way in the world.


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[Assistant] But we are rather racing ahead of ourselves, because it would be many years before John Dickens' prophecy was fulfilled, and to find out how it happened, we need to head for Portsmouth.


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[Assistant] Charles John Huffam Dickens was born in this modest Portsmouth house to John and Elizabeth Dickens on the 7th February 1812.


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[Assistant] Now the Charles Dickens Birthplace Museum and visitors can see where our author made his first rather humble appearance.


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[Assistant] Moving on, five years, and we've come to Chatham, 11 Ordnance Terrace to be precise. Although when John Dickens and family moved here in 1817, it was actually number two.


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[Assistant] From Portsmouth, John Dickens had been posted to London, where, on a reduced income, his debts had started to mount up. But it was a brief stay, and by the time the family arrived here at Chatham, Charles had two sisters, one older and one younger. But a baby brother had died in infancy.


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[Assistant] Although the location is far from being rural Britain at its beautiful best, when Charles Dickens lived here, there was a hayfield where the railway station stands today.


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[Assistant] As a child, he spent hours out playing and many of the individuals he encountered even at this early age made a lasting impression on his blossoming imagination.


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[Assistant] His childhood friend, George Strougill, who lived at No. 1 Ordnance Terrace, emerged as the charismatic steerforth in David Copperfield, while the Dickens family's faithful servant, Mary Weller, was immortalized as the redoubtable Clara Peggety in the same autobiographical work.


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[Assistant] As a small boy, Charles had no idea of the debts his father had been running up, something he would do his whole life long, constantly living beyond his means.


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[Assistant] Nevertheless, the family grew in size and inevitably, with hungry mouths to feed, it was necessary to move to more modest lodgings in Chatham.


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[Assistant] It would have been during this period in Charles Dickens' life that a walk to Hyham, past Gadshill Place, resulted in John Dickens inspiring his son to make his mark on the world.


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[Assistant] The lovely village of Cobham, where the leather bottle pub as popular today with Dickens enthusiasts as it was when our author was alive, is typical of this part of Kent.


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[Assistant] But there's one delightful church in the charming village of Cooling that is visited by those on the Charles Dickens Trail even more often than the leather bottle.


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[Assistant] This is the church of St. James at Cooling, and a walk through this graveyard will reveal a remarkable treasure for anyone interested in the works of Charles Dickens.


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[Assistant] Thought to have been the inspiration for the sinister place where young Pip encounters the malevolent convict Magwitch in Great Expectations, the opening lines of this dramatic novel leave us in no doubt whatsoever that it's the same atmospheric location that Charles Dickens was remembering.


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[Assistant] At such a time, I found out for certain that this bleak place overgrown with nettles was the churchyard.


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[Assistant] And that Philip Pirip, late of this parish, and also Georgiana, wife of the above, were dead and buried. And that Alexander, Bartholomew, Abraham, Tobias and Roger, infant children of the aforesaid, were also dead and buried.


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[Assistant] And that the dark, flat wilderness beyond the churchyard, intersected with dikes and mounds and gates, with scattered cattle feeding on it, was the marshes.


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[Assistant] Dickens only talks of five tragic little graves in his novel. But there are thirteen tiny tombs here at Cooling. And as the church is no longer in use, you certainly get a sense of a truly eerie landscape.


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[Assistant] Nevertheless, if you ask a cross-section of people to define what makes a classically Dickensian scene, it'll often include snow, an old coaching inn, and the timbered high street of a country town.


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[Assistant] This is Rochester, and for anyone hoping to catch a glimpse of Charles Dickens' ghost, I have been reliably informed that this is definitely the place to come.


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[Assistant] Either side of me, if evidence is required, you can see just how historically important Rochester is, boasting perhaps the best preserved castle in England, and a cathedral that happens to be one of the nation's oldest.


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[Assistant] Now, fascinating as the beautiful ancient architecture might be, if you're still looking for that classic Dickensian scene, you need go no further than Rochester's long straggling high street, as it was described by the man himself in Sketches by Boz, way back in 1836.


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[Assistant] It's no wonder that the very young, impressionable and very imaginative Charles Dickens was captivated by this colourful street. Standing here today, I'm equally enthralled by this unique place.


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[Assistant] The idea of a coach and horses pulling in here to the Royal Victoria and Bull Hotel carrying Mr Pickwick and his friends is as delightful as ever and a blanket of crisp white snow would complete the picture to perfection.


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[Assistant] Mr. Winkle, who sits at the extreme edge, with one leg dangling in the air, is nearly precipitated into the street as the coach twists round the sharp corner by the cheesemonger's shop and turns into the marketplace.


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[Assistant] And before Mr. Snodgrass, who sits next to him, has recovered from his alarm, they pull up at the inn yard where the fresh horses with pots on are already waiting.


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[Assistant] Again, I think we all now know exactly where the inspiration for this extract from the Pickwick papers came from.


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[Assistant] But if you'd like to discover the reason for Charles Dickens' preoccupation with snow at Christmas time, join me again in just a few moments.


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[Assistant] There's no chance of snow today, but if you come to Rochester for the annual Dickensian Christmas Festival, you're guaranteed snow, even if it does have to be of the artificial variety.


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[Assistant] But not all of Dickens' childhood memories were quite so happy. And in 1822, when he moved with his family back to London, the dark, dismal world that young Charles entered was as far removed from beautiful rural Kent as could possibly be imagined.


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[Assistant] Right from John Dickens' arrival in London, the financial troubles that had beset him for so many years got progressively worse.


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[Assistant] And any hopes young Charles had of receiving an education were dashed.


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[Assistant] Not least, because as the oldest boy, he'd already been put to work in Warren's Blacking, a boot polish factory run by a relation of his mother.


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[Assistant] Then to complete the humiliation of the sensitive child, John Dickens was arrested for debt and thrown into the Marshall C. Prison.


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[Assistant] And the rest of the family joined him there, apart from Charles, who was left to work 10 hours a day in the factory.


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[Assistant] Eventually, an inheritance from a distant relation secured the Dickens family release, but Charles never forgave his mother for forcing him to continue at the Blacking factory.


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[Assistant] Although in the end, his father's determination that his son should go to school won the day. And for two years, while in his early teens, Charles attended the Wellington House Academy.


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[Assistant] Which seems quite remarkable when you return to Gadshill Place.


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[Assistant] It's hard to believe as I sit here in the grand house where Dickens penned such classics as A Tale of Two Cities and Great Expectations, that such a brief education, coupled with a little schooling at Chatham courtesy of a neighbour, was enough to set Charles on his way.


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[Assistant] Taking a junior position with London law firm Ellis & Blakemore, Dickens worked hard to rise above the impecunious habits of his father, and even taught himself shorthand, enabling him to become a parliamentary journalist reporting on the proceedings in the House of Commons.


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[Assistant] The law became a great fascination for Dickens, the plight of the poor who'd fallen foul of the British judiciary system even more so and would soon become a major source of inspiration as he started to write short stories under the pen name Boz alongside his journalistic endeavours.


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[Assistant] Things began to look up as the blossoming young writer, now in his early twenties, was able to take rooms at Furnival's Inn to become a gentleman about town. And after being commissioned to write short stories by George Hogarth, editor of The Evening Chronicle,


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[Assistant] His sketches by Boz were quickly followed by the first installment of the Pickwick papers.


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[Assistant] And with his unexpected rise to prominence, he married Catherine Hogarth, the daughter of the man who had in effect launched his son-in-law's professional writing career.


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[Assistant] This charming timber-boarded cottage has a plaque claiming it was the house that Charles and Catherine stayed in, but it's been suggested that the original would have actually stood on the other side of the road.


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[Assistant] While here, Charles would have been writing further instalments of the Pickwick papers.


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[Assistant] And you only have to look at the old forge to see that he was already collecting ideas that would last his entire writing career, as this is where it's believed Dickens found the inspiration for Joe Gargery's blacksmith's forge in Great Expectations.


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[Assistant] After their honeymoon, Charles and Catherine returned to Furnivals Inn, where they were joined by Catherine's younger sister, Mary.


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[Assistant] The couple's first son, Charles Junior, was born on the 6th of January 1837, but all was far from well, as Catherine slipped into what we would recognize today as postnatal depression.


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[Assistant] As Kent evidently had great restorative powers for Charles, Catherine, baby Charles and Mary came back to Chalk, while Charles Sr. commuted between London and his family as he continued to advance his writing career.


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[Assistant] Then in April 1837, as a successful author, still only 25 years of age, Charles Dickens secured 48 Doughty Street in the London district of Hoban for his family.


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[Assistant] And this is the only London house that Dickens lived in that's still standing.


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[Assistant] Today, it's the Charles Dickens Museum. However, it was here that tragedy struck just weeks after they all moved in, and it would influence Dickens' entire writing career, and very possibly damaged his marriage.


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[Assistant] She became immortalized as little Nell in the old curiosity shop.


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[Assistant] But when Dickens had young, beautiful and good inscribed on the unfortunate girl's headstone, who can say what his wife must have thought?


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[Assistant] As Oliver Twist followed the Pickwick papers and a succession of wonderful novels appeared in print, the moment finally came when John Dickens' prophecy that his son might one day live at Gadshill Place came true.


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[Assistant] Charles Dickens, now in his mid-forties, was an international phenomenon.


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[Assistant] More than 30 years after his father's most astute words were spoken, Dickens' boyhood dream came true.


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[Assistant] By the time he bought Gadshill Place in 1856, he was already arguably the most successful novelist in the English language.


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[Assistant] And should you be wondering why I've brought you here to a tunnel of all places, there's actually a very good reason. Because it runs under the main road, and Dickens had it built especially for him.


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[Assistant] Our esteemed author was given a Swiss chalet where he loved to write, and it stood immediately across the road from Gadshill Place, which is why Dickens had the tunnel constructed so that he could move between the house and the chalet without ever being noticed.


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[Assistant] In fact, you can find the Swiss Chalet in the gardens of East Gate House on Rochester High Street, and it does look as if it would have been an idyllic place to write.


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[Assistant] You may be thinking by now that Charles Dickens was only happy when surrounded by the Kentish landscape of his boyhood.


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[Assistant] But the east coast of the county pleased him equally well.


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[Assistant] Broadstairs was a particular favourite and gazing out to sea was a major source of inspiration for Dickens.


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[Assistant] He always tried to spend a month here every year, in what was then called Fort House, but is now better known, not surprisingly, as Bleak House.


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[Assistant] When his travels abroad prevented him from visiting in 1844 and 46, Dickens claimed to be hankering after the good old, tiredy, salt little pier of broad stairs. And you can really see why.


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[Assistant] For Charles Dickens, travel became a regular part of his life, and crossing the Atlantic as he gave reading tours of America meant that he became something of a celebrity.


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[Assistant] Finally, it seemed that Charles Dickens had overcome the torment of his youth and the squalor of London to find contentment here in the countryside that he loved so dearly.


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[Assistant] A social campaigner with a voice that was always listened to. As a writer, he did more than any politician to raise awareness of the plight of the poor, especially the children.


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[Assistant] But happiness still eluded Charles Dickens. His marriage to Catherine had failed.


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[Assistant] And in a bitter separation, he sent his wife to live away from him and their children.


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[Assistant] Although he undoubtedly fell in love with the young actress Ellen Ternan, whatever passed between them was kept secret, and Dickens drove himself relentlessly onwards, writing and giving public readings.


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[Assistant] By the time Dickens started work on The Mystery of Edwin Drood, it was again Rochester providing him with his inspiration. He talks of the old stone gatehouse crossing the close with an arched thoroughfare passing beneath it. And you see before you, the very gatehouse.


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[Assistant] Sadly, the mystery of Edwin Drood was never completed. On a June morning, Charles Dickens stood at these gates, apparently just staring in, before returning home to Gadshill Place.


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[Assistant] This is Restoration House, where Dickens took his inspiration for Miss Havisham's decaying mansion in Great Expectations, and it's impossible not to speculate frankly as to whether our author was bidding Rochester a fond farewell, because later the same day he had a stroke from which he never recovered.


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[Assistant] Charles Dickens died on the 9th of June 1870 at the age of 58, having achieved success beyond even his wildest dreams.


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[Assistant] So, characteristically, he wanted to be buried in Rochester Cathedral, but the nation demanded such a literary great, who they considered to be their own, be laid to rest in Westminster Abbey's Poets Corner. All we can hope, standing next to this memorial plaque.


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[Assistant] Is that the wonderful words spoken by Sydney Carton to conclude a tale of two cities held true for their creator, Charles Dickens, leaving the man who had loved this part of rural Britain so much to rest in peace.


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[Assistant] All that remains is to thank you for allowing me to be your guide through the evocative Kent countryside that so captivated Charles Dickens, and cordially invite you to join me again next time to visit another of Britain's beautiful landscapes, which inspired the creation of further great works of classic literature.


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[Assistant] Hello everyone! It's me, Dilly Sims, and welcome back to my channel. Today we're playing Let's Play The Sims 4, Soap Opera Legacy Challenge.


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[Assistant] So if you're not caught up, there's only been like one episode, so it's okay if you haven't been caught up. Go watch it.


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[Assistant] This is a new family. Juliette and... I've... Last time I called him Blake. Ryan Drew.


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[Assistant] And they're a cute, not newlywed couple, they're just good friends who are now, like, romantically involved, and Juliet is pregnant, and we have to tell her parents, because they're- oop, I hit the wrong button.


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[Assistant] And we have to tell our parents because Juliet comes from a really wealthy upper class family. We're gonna see what happens.


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[Assistant] Cause our backyard's looking really dim. And remember, Juliet is from, you know, upper middle class.


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[Assistant] Ryan really does need to impress her father.


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[Assistant] And her mother, and her sisters. And I was thinking, you know what? Since we're gonna... tell...


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[Assistant] Juliet's mom and dad, we might as well tell Ryan's mom and dad.


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[Assistant] And sister. Cause he has one sister, she has two sisters. And they're all very fun characters that I made a speed build of. Err, not speed build.


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[Assistant] Let's try to just go through the barbecue today and then maybe next week we'll get married.


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[Assistant] Okay. Oh, time to go to work guys. Work time.


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[Assistant] Aww, look at the pregnant mother. She's so pretty. Pregnant women just like glow.


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[Assistant] Bye guys, have fun at work, bring home that cash money.


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[Assistant] You don't have to pay bills yet, right? Then no, thank god. And we need to buy a barbecue pit and a little...


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[Assistant] Table for outside. Hopefully a table that can fit everybody. How many Sims can we fit in our house? Or in- on a table? Eight, I think at the most. Oh, hello. Promotion. Good job, Juliet.


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[Assistant] Let's start setting up the barbecue. Alright. Yeah, the barbecue outside.


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[Assistant] Oh wait, we need a centerpiece to show off that we've got class. Oh, look at these. Oh, he already got a business award.


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[Assistant] He's going places, guys. He's gonna go places. He's gonna get a billion dollar home. He's gonna be a billionaire.


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[Assistant] Did all of our guests sleep? No. No, no, they're all hanging out in the kitchen.


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[Assistant] Look at him, he's like, seated super far away from everyone, and the only other people on this dinner table are Ryan and his sister. He really hates the Drew family, doesn't he?


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[Assistant] He's like, you need to make more money for my daughter.


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[Assistant] Aww, they're gonna make a great couple and a great mom and dad.


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[Assistant] Juliet's sister Juliet is leaving. I should really get going now. She doesn't like the idea. Sally's is leaving too. It's okay.


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[Assistant] Aw, she chose love. Mean, yell at him. Insult, actually insult him. Insult him and tell him that he's a horrible father and he does nothing but work.


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[Assistant] You know what, I have a few more minutes. Tomorrow we are getting married.


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[Assistant] Because we're gonna try to have the- we're gonna try to get married before the baby is born, and the baby is gonna be born in question mark, question mark, question mark.


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[Assistant] The family's gone. Ryan is cleaning up. Juliet, what are you doing? Getting a glass of water?


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[Assistant] Well, I guess I'm gonna put them to sleep and tomorrow we're gonna get married. Tomorrow we're getting married!


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[Assistant] I do have Rom- I was gonna say Romeo, oh my god. Ryan and Juliet's parents still here.


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[Assistant] Because I realized if I move- go to a different household, they- Juliet might have the baby without us knowing. So I didn't want to risk it.


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[Assistant] And work starts in seven hours, but we should call in for sick leave. When you wake up, we'll call in for sick leave. Or family leave, I should say. It's very important that we take that time off. So we can get married!


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[Assistant] Why not? I'll- I'll pimp out the backyard.


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[Assistant] What if we have the baby during the wedding? Imagine how crazy that would be. Hey Julia, you need to call in to work while you're peeing right now at 4 o'clock in the morning. Take family leave, where's family, family, family? Take family leave. I need to take one day of family leave right now. It's super family oriented.


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[Assistant] For one day, beautiful. Let's wake you up.


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[Assistant] And have YOU call for family leave as well.


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[Assistant] She's wearing jewelry and makeup for the first time. That's cute. We're keeping it.


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[Assistant] Of what these characters should go through, let me know in the comment section below. And, it may, it, it might happen. Okay, bye everybody.


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[Assistant] Of what these characters should go through, let me know in the comment section below. And, it may, it, it might happen. Okay, bye everybody. Whoopsies, I shook the camera.


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[Assistant] Of what these characters should go through, let me know in the comment section below. And, it may, it, it might happen. Okay, bye everybody.


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[Assistant] Of what these characters should go through, let me know in the comment section below. And, it may, it might happen. Okay, bye everybody.


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[Assistant] In rural villages, snow days were also happy moments when villagers sat around the fire warming themselves.


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[Assistant] And beans, frying in an iron vessel over the fire.


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[Assistant] Game of crackling sounds and an inviting aroma as well.


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[Assistant] Someone mischievously sprinkled some snow into the vessel. Alas, children fell out with each other for that, but they reconciled instantly.


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[Assistant] Watching together the sizzling evaporation of the snowy water in the vessel around the fire for warmth only.


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[Assistant] No, something eye-opening would enhance the fun.


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[Assistant] Pea would come out frozen and remain unbroken even when hitting the ground.


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[Assistant] Which was followed by disbelieving hisses from the listeners.


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[Assistant] Hearing that, fish would jump right out of a river through the hole cut into its frozen surface. Someone smacked his mouth hungrily, but comforted himself by saying,


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[Assistant] What was the good in eating fish with so many tiny bones in it? And the frozen rivers there, as adults said, could even support a tank driving across.


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[Assistant] And that sparked a craving in the child listeners.


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[Assistant] For an adventure of skating on a frozen pond.


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[Assistant] And in early spring, when peach trees are in full blossom, shower down and occasional snow,


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[Assistant] With snowflakes whirling and dancing in the air with swaying peach flowers.


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[Assistant] That's the wish for snow lingers into March in the heart of people loving snow. It is a season of snow again.


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[Assistant] I yearn for the snow in my hometown and the wintry charms of my central north.


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[Assistant] Today's program ends here. Thank you for listening.


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[Assistant] You can find yourself to break any arms and legs of the poor people in the hospital.


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[Assistant] How the Dingleydale Cricket Club played Orr Muggleton, and how Orr Muggleton dined at the Dingleydale expense, with other interesting and instructive matters.


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[Assistant] Mr. Pickwick was no sluggard, and he sprang like an ardent warrior from his tent. Bedstead. Pleasant


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[Assistant] Who could live to gaze from day to day on bricks and slates who had once felt the influence of a scene like this? Who could continue to exist where there are no cows but the cows on the chimney pots? Nothing relevant of pan but pantiles