charles barrow's writing

In the latest instalment of my 'Visit Famous Writers' Homes - in the hopes that some magic writing dust will fall onto my shoulders', I took a trip to Shakespeare's Birth Place.   After my summer outings to Virginia Woolf's home, Monk's House, and Vita Sackville-West's stately pile at Sissinghurst, I finally ticked Stratford Upon Avon, birth place and life long home to William Shakespeare, off my bucket list. I mean, if you want to sweet-talk the writing muse then you really have to visit the stomping ground of the OG and Godfather of writing, don't you? I thought Stratford Upon Avon was a complete delight. From the narrow cobbled streets, flanked with Tudor buildings, to the large open grassy areas full of broadleaved trees, beside the slow running River Avon, there is something of interest around every corner. The huge theatre that is home to the Royal Shakespeare Company. Bronze statues of Lady Macbeth, King Hal, and Hamlet. Buskers quoting The Bard...

This plant caught my eye. It's growing in the barest scrape of dirt in the road by the kerb, and I marvel at its tenacity to survive and flourish against all the odds. But I kind of resent it too. I lavish care and attention on some of the plants in my border. They get a good grade multi-purpose compost, a seaweed feed, and regular weeding, and yet they don't look anywhere near as healthy, nor floriferous as this neglected weed. But this weed did spark some thoughts. I'm going to wrestle to draw a parallel now, between the fact of this weed thriving in the gutter, and one of my writing projects. I can lavish much care and attention on a story idea. I can visit with it everyday for months, make notes, do research, write a draft, revise said draft, and even so, it will ultimately wither and perish. But then again, I can make a few scant notes on another story idea, throw the notebook into a drawer and forget about it for many months, sometimes even years, and then I'll su...

Last week, in the company of dear friends, I was lucky enough to visit two beautiful English gardens, blooming in the June sunshine. Luckier still these gardens were attached to two different, very slightly 'stately', homes, once owned by two wonderful women writers. The first was Monk's House, in Sussex. A 17th century retreat, once owned by Virginia Woolf and her husband Leonard. The few rooms in the house that we were allowed to walk through were gloomy, and atmospheric, and fascinating. But the room of real interest was Virginia's writing room. It was in a large summer house, set apart from the main house, further down the garden, amongst fruit trees and cottage garden borders. Unfortunately visitors weren't allowed to enter the room, but could gaze into it through large windows set in three sides of the building. The room was full of items that had once belonged to Virginia, and were arranged around the room, and on the desk, as if the room was still in use and...

I've been watching the blackbirds in my garden; male, female and baby. All three rush around the lawn, searching for worms. The juvenile is learning the ropes from its parents. Soon the parents will stop feeding it, and it'll have to fly off and find its own territory. I sometimes see the male blackbird, on a high branch in the plane tree in the street outside, or sitting on top of the freshly trimmed hedge that divides street from garden. I do hear him singing some evenings, a loud, melodious, full throated song, designed to carry through the thick woodlands, wherein these birds used to live. Thick woodlands are no longer as common as they were, so my blackbird lives in a hedged around garden, and sings a song that is now a little extra for his surroundings. It's said to be good luck if a blackbird nests near your house. And in Celtic mythology a blackbird is believed to be one of the three oldest animals in creation, the first bird. The other two creatures are the stag an...

I'll always stop to read a blue plaque on the wall of a house, to satisfy my idle curiosity about who may have been born, lived, briefly visited (yes I'm talking about you Charles Dickens), or died in the property. Very often I find I haven't even heard of the luminary being honoured, so it's as well the plaque always tells me what said honouree did for a living, or why they're being recognised. However, I recently came upon this beautiful slate plaque on the stone gatepost of a very large house in Oxford, and whilst the written information on offer is minimal, this is more than compensated for by the simple visual cue, which is stellar. Photo is the author's own.

Emergence I steel myself to step outside. A final glance through the window reveals crystal blue skies, an early sun gilding black branches, glittering frost in pockets of shadow on the borders; riming emerald crocus spears. “Bury them deep. Bulbs are a promise of brighter days. Like treasure.” These were almost his final words to me, as we laboured last autumn. “Golds, amethysts, pearls. Riches for when you’ll need them most. Afterwards.” I’d been wrapped in a smothering duvet of despair. Since. With neither the will nor strength to cast it off. My heart a bitter winter graveyard of grief.  Yet today breaks, somehow, differently. Those resolute crocuses will have pushed their way through earth like iron, just as he’d promised. A reminder that hard winters do fall away, springtime does return, offering renewal. I crack open my door. Birdsong drifts in and calls me out into a newly defined world. Photo is the authors own