Part 6: "Sweet Swan of Avon." (Johnson)

What needs my Shakespeare for his honour’d bones,

The labour of an age in piled stones,

Or that his hallow’d relics should be hid

Under a star-y-pointing pyramid?

Dear son of memory, great heir of fame,

What need’st thou such weak witness of thy name?

John Milton (1608-1674), Epitaph on Shakespeare.

I first saw these gardens behind Shakespeare's Birthplace when I was 16. I had hiked from Ireland to the village of Charwelton to visit "Auntie Jeannie", my mother's stepmother. She was summering in Brighton, but her family offered to put me up for the night and took me here, to Stratford-upon-Avon, before driving me to London. The trouble is, as I visit again, forty-three years later, I seem to have no recollection of what I had seen here! Strange, considering that William Shakespeare became a primary focus of my teaching career for thirty-six years. Still, whatever the inadequacies of my memory, there is nothing inadequate in visiting some of the key places in William Shakespeare's life.





We are early as is our touring custom, so the bigger crowds of companion tourists are not yet cluttering the sites. We tour the house, after skipping through the Shakespeare exhibit at the Shakespeare Centre, through which we enter. (I feel guilty about not reading every panel of every exhibit, but I know all the information, and Sammy is less patient that some: he likes to see things first-hand.)



I am struck by the incongruity we see everywhere in England: we stand in an Elizabethan timber-frame building while meters away are modern shops, vehicles, electronic gadgets and people from across the globe. I start to notice the subtle intrusion of modernity into this world of 400 years ago: discreet switches, fire alarms and extinguishers, security systems, displays. Still, it is fascinating to walk through the rooms in which young William lived, to see where he was born, and started his married life. As for the decor, it is described as being authentic and contains some originals. I love the painted wall-coverings that set the family apart as being of a relatively affluent class.

(The official photo of Grampy, taken by Sam, in front of the Birthplace, on Henley Street. Above is Henley Street, towards the Birthplace, up the street to the right.)



We visit Hall's Croft, the home of Dr. John Croft and his wife, Susanna Shakespeare, the oldest daughter. Built in 1613, it is reasoned that this building is the authentic dwelling and consulting-room where Dr. Hall practised medicine, such as it was in the 1600s.



In the garden behind, we see the first of the Greg Wyatt sculptures, of which several others are in the New Place Great Garden. I assume it represents A Midsummer Night's Dream, but forget to read the plaque carefully!







We find Nash's House and the site of New Place on Chapel Street. New Place was the finest home in Stratford and Shakespeare owned it for the last eighteen years of his life. He died here, having returned from London, likely ill, at the end of his career in the theatre. It was demolished in 1759 by its owner, protesting the taxes. Here, I photograph Mary, against the wall of Nash's House, which would have been the wall against which New Place stood. Nash's House was owned by Thomas Nash, who married Shakespeare's granddaughter Elizabeth Hall in 1626. They actually lived in New Place, which Shakespeare had bequeathed to his daughter, Susannah, following Shakespeare's death. Elizabeth Hall was the last direct descendant of the great playwright, and those who claim relationship to Shakespeare, do so through Elizabeth.






New Place stood on extensive grounds. Fragmentary remains of the foundation are still here and the two gardens mentioned in the property deeds have been restored. Below, Steve and Sammy stand in the Elizabeth-style knot garden created in 1919-20, with the Guild Chapel on the left and Nash's House on the right.
Through the pergola--a trellis-work tunnel--we enter the Great Garden. It is contained within box and yew hedges, and contains an old mulberry said to have been grown from a cutting taken from a mulberry planted by Shakespeare. I am more intrigued by the Greg Wyatt sculptures that ring the expanse of lawn. I photograph them and have my picture taken with his sculpture representing Hamlet, the greatest Shakspearean tragedy.




Meanwhile, Sammy reads me the inscription on the great monument at the side of the Great Garden:

This Alto Relievo

Shakespeare seated between the dramatic muse and the genius of painting.

Formerly in front of the Shakespeare Gallery, Pall Mall, London,

Was presented to this town by Charles Holt Bracebridge, Esq.

Atherston Hall 1871

In Trinity Church we find the grave of William Shakespeare and his family. I do remember this from 1965. Unlike other sites it has not changed at all. We are piqued that we must pay to get to the chancel to see the grave and bust, but money was not going to prevent me from visiting. Shakespeare was buried here in 1616, a privilege bestowed upon him because he had become a "lay rector" in 1605. Alongside him are his wife, Anne, and other family members. The bust was erected a few years after his death. Despite the fact that it was placed when his widow and friends were still alive, its authenticity as a good likeness is disputed.

Good friend for Jesus Sake Forebeare,

To digg the dust encloased heare.

Blese be the Man that Spares these Stones,

And Curst be he that Moves my Bones.

We found a restaurant on Henley Street, called Mistress Quickly's. The food was excellent. I enjoyed a robust lamb stew and a Stella; the others enjoyed their luncheon, too.

We cannot miss Anne Hathaway's cottage. I have been here before and often told my students the stories of William's marriage to the pregnant Anne, who was eight-years-older than Shakespeare. Anthony Burgess (and others) explain that the marriage was likely a "pitch-fork-wedding" with Anne's family and their farmer friends using "bribes" to force young Will to do the right thing after his May Days frolic with the older Miss Hathaway!

I ask the guide about the 1969 fire that nearly destroyed the cottage in Shottery. He explains that a young man had a quarrel with his girlfriend. Angered, he had gone downtown and gotten drunk at the pub. He bought a gallon of petrol and came to the cottage and set the end wall ablaze, seeking some dramatic way to show how upset he was. He was eventually arrested, put in gaol, and later released to marry the young woman. He still lives in Stratford. I get the impression his life has not turned out well: divorce, crippling arthritis. . . . Mary mutters something about karma.

It is a wonderful place to visit, full of original furnishings and reproductions. My guidebook says: "despite its romantic associations, as the place where the teenage Shakespeare courted his future wife"--I laugh and doubt there was much courting--maybe a hay mow somewhere!

The Hathaway Cottage is considered "the quintessential country cottage." The guidebook says that "the view of the house from across the garden has inspired countless paintings and photographs, and represents one of the most familiar images of 'old England'. " The house is built from timber, stone and brick, with a thatched roof that partly conceals its diamond-paned dormer windows. Some evidence of the fire remains, and there isn't a right-angle in the building, but it is remarkable how it has survived so well, considering that countless visitors have walked through here, even before 1892, when it was purchased by the Shakespeare Birthplace Trust.

It starts to rain so the Millers go to the nearby giftshop while I hurry through the Shakespeare Tree Garden, created in 1988. Recently, unusual sculptures have been placed here, the works of young American and British artists inspired by The Bard. My favourite is this one, representing Hamlet, by Michelle Firpo Capiello.

The gardens here are as beautiful as any, and before we leave, I notice a perfect pink rose.

Shakespeare, himself, used the rose often, as image and metaphor.

Ophelia had said of her lover: "He is the rose and expectancy of the whole state." Later, after she becomes mad, her brother speaks sadly of what has become of her:

Laertes: O heat, dry up my brains! tears seven times salt,
Burn out the sense and virtue of mine eye!
By heaven, thy madness shall be paid by weight,
Till our scale turn the beam. O rose of May!
Dear maid, kind sister, sweet Ophelia!
O heavens! is't possible, a young maid's wits
Should be as mortal as an old man's life?
Nature is fine in love, and where 'tis fine,
It sends some precious instance of itself
After the thing it loves.

Sonnet 54



O, how much more doth beauty beauteous seem By that sweet ornament which truth doth give! The rose looks fair, but fairer we it deem For that sweet odour which doth in it live. The canker-blooms have full as deep a dye As the perfumed tincture of the roses, Hang on such thorns and play as wantonly When summer's breath their masked buds discloses: But, for their virtue only is their show, They live unwoo'd and unrespected fade, Die to themselves. Sweet roses do not so; Of their sweet deaths are sweetest odours made: And so of you, beauteous and lovely youth, When that shall fade, my verse distills your truth.