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A Countryman’s Summer Notebook
In this third volume of our seasonal quartet, Adrian Bell takes us into the summer countryside, to smell the hawthorn in ‘hedges suddenly become cliffs of white’, to linger in quiet churches, wander through country towns, and hear the voices of the craftsmen and women, the farmers and farm labourers whose lives are rooted in the Suffolk soil.
It was a countryside Bell grew to love when he became a farmer there soon after the First World War. Joining him in his wanderings is a magical experience, as it must have been for the readers of the Eastern Daily Press, who followed Bell’s regular column for thirty years between 1950 and 1980. Today his pieces have the extra element of nostalgia, for as he wanders, and relishes, and ruminates, Bell is recording a world that was fast disappearing. But he is never sentimental. His perceptions are sharp and invigorating and, as these little pieces show, his approach to the countryside was well ahead of his time.
‘Flowers and conversations are the best pleasures I know,’ Bell wrote. In these lovely evocations of summer in the Suffolk landscape, he gives us both, from his meeting with an old farmer whose words ‘were like something out of the Bible’ to the sight of daisies ‘glad as confetti in the long grass’.
It was a countryside Bell grew to love when he became a farmer there soon after the First World War. Joining him in his wanderings is a magical experience, as it must have been for the readers of the Eastern Daily Press, who followed Bell’s regular column for thirty years between 1950 and 1980. Today his pieces have the extra element of nostalgia, for as he wanders, and relishes, and ruminates, Bell is recording a world that was fast disappearing. But he is never sentimental. His perceptions are sharp and invigorating and, as these little pieces show, his approach to the countryside was well ahead of his time.
‘Flowers and conversations are the best pleasures I know,’ Bell wrote. In these lovely evocations of summer in the Suffolk landscape, he gives us both, from his meeting with an old farmer whose words ‘were like something out of the Bible’ to the sight of daisies ‘glad as confetti in the long grass’.
221 pages, Hardcover
Published May 1, 2024
About the author
Adrian Bell
58 books9 followersAdrian Bell is one of the best-known of modern writers dealing with the countryside. His books are noted for their close observations of country life.
The son of a newspaper editor, Bell was born in London and educated at Uppingham School in Rutland. At the age of 19 he ventured into the countryside in Hundon, Suffolk, to learn about agriculture, and he farmed in various locations over the next sixty years, including the rebuilding of a near-derelict 89-acre smallholding at Redisham.
The son of a newspaper editor, Bell was born in London and educated at Uppingham School in Rutland. At the age of 19 he ventured into the countryside in Hundon, Suffolk, to learn about agriculture, and he farmed in various locations over the next sixty years, including the rebuilding of a near-derelict 89-acre smallholding at Redisham.
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June 23, 2024
There is perhaps less variety of subject in this collection as in Winter's and Spring's collections, and the reader should be prepared for much discussion of hay, but I'm sure that is a natural result of its domination over the farmer's yearly cycle of activities. Yet amid that, you get the same wonderful moments from the other seasons' notebooks when Bell illuminates the connectedness over time of people to the land and to each other, and both the continuity of the activity, and the abrupt changes to that continuity which happened throughout the 20th Century. These windows into a way of life that once dominated our ancestors but is virtually unknown to so many of us in the present day are not just literary treats, but historical and anthropological treasures. Richard Hawking and Slightly Foxed must again be thanked for bringing us these collections, in editions that themselves are beautiful tactile jewels reminding us of the valuable traditions and qualities of bookmaking.
And best news of all: Autumn's edition is due to be released in just a few months!
And best news of all: Autumn's edition is due to be released in just a few months!
Displaying 1 of 1 review