Monday 12 July 2010

Inheritance: The story of Knole and the Sackville-Wests


A couple of weeks ago, I went along to the Woodstock Bookshop for their latest talk, by Robert Sackville-West, on his book Inheritance, about the house Knole and the Sackville-West family to whom it has belonged since its purchase by Thomas Sackville-West in 1604. I was particularly interested to attend this talk having become a fan of the writing of Vita Sackville West through my Virago Venture earlier this year - her books All Passion Spent and No Signposts in the sea are particular favourites. I have long been keen to visit Sissinghurst gardens for its association with Vita, but did not know about Knole - I discovered that many of VSW's novels used Knole as their inspiration. I am now desperate to visit!

The house itself sounded absolutely fascinating - it is supposedly a "calendar" house - with 365 rooms, 52 staircases and 7 courtyards (however, this is only alleged, no-one has apparently counted the rooms to make certain). Robert Sackville-West and his family recently moved into a wing of the house, having been living in a cottage in the grounds for some time. The house is now owned by the National Trust but a number of family members have apartments within it (well there is certainly plenty of room!). RSW talked about the problems of refurbishing the apartment within the bounds of English heritage, but also touched on the good sides of living in such a remarkable place - primarily its fantastic history. A big house apparently lends itself to a lot of cupboards and thus to a culture of keeping everything providing RSW with a huge archive of material - letters, diaries, artefacts, to draw upon in writing this book. RSW was not sure that his 5 year old daughter agreed however, reporting that she had recently complained that "Susan visited my house at the weekend. It's not fair, I have to be invited if I want to go to her house!)

After the talk, I contacted Alice at Bloomsbury who very kindly sent me a copy of the book to read and write about. It filled out the details of the talk and provided a much more in depth look at the Sackville-West family and their lives. It is a wonderful story of an aristocratic family through the generations - I found Victoria, Vita's mother a fascinating character - RSW has gleaned lots of information from her incredibly candid diaries (for example, they reveal in code where and when she made love to her husband). The book, as revealed by the title, is based around the theme of "Inheritance" and the passing of the estate through generations - extraordinarily there were few straight father-son inheritances; Robert Sackville West is no exception, having inherited from his uncle. Vita Sackville-West was particularly devastated not to inherit the property.

My only disappointment was that there weren't more pictures - I would have loved to have seen more images of the interiors and plans of the house at various stages throughout its history. But perhaps the book is really more the biography of the people who lived in the house than a biography of the place itself, and in that RSW has undoubtedly written a masterpiece. If you have any interest in English country house and aristocratic life at any point between the 17th and 21st centuries, then do pick up a copy of this book. I have been dropping hints about a trip to Kent and very much hope to be able to visit Knole, with this book in hand, before too long.

13 comments:

  1. Verity, you will so enjoy Sissinghurst, you can see the room that she wrote in. Knole is on my list for a visit as well and having read your review, I shall be picking this up when I am there I expect.

    Thanks indeed for sharing

    Hannah

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  2. I went to Knole last weekend! I live literally five minutes away from it! It's a gorgeous house but unfortunately very little is actually on public display which is a bit disappointing. I think this is because, as you say, so much of the house is still privately used by the family. It does have a lovely feel about it though, especially as you can see Robert's children's toys scattered across their private garden from inside the house! I highly recommend a visit! I saw this in the book shop at Knole and I'm sure Sevenoaks library will have a copy for me to check out as I'd love to read it after your review!

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  3. I love the idea of a calendar house!! This is another one on my wish list - ever since I was little I've loved visiting stately homes and country houses and imagining the people who lived there so I think this is what attracted me to this book when saw it in the bookshop!

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  4. Everything I hear about this book makes me more and more excited to read it! While I've never read any VSW (and am not planning to any time in the immediate future), I love to read about the history of family homes, the larger the better.

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  5. I've never heard of a calendar house but I love the idea! I can't believe nobody's counted the rooms to confirm. If it were my house I'd have counted the rooms and made a list of all of them - which I did when I was a kid, but my house had fewer rooms than 365. :p

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  6. A post which brings back fond teenage memories. We studied Knole as part of our GCSE History (a Country Houses module - how great was that?!) I think we spent most of the time imagining it was our house to hold parties in, rather than looking at the bits we were supposed to! Go in the summer the grounds are lovely for picnicing.

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  7. I have a copy of All Passion Spent on the shelf waiting to be read. Must get to it!

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  8. Tea lady - All passion spent is a must read!

    Joan - how amazing to do a module on country houses - my history GCSE was definitely not so englightened.

    Jenny - yes, I was surprised that no-one had counted as I used to count our rooms regularly - I was never quite sure what counted as a room though when we had an open plan living room/dining room!

    Claire - you might be tempted into VSW after reading this book to see a novel centred on an actual country house...

    Hannah - I will drop more hints about a weekend in Kent; it may have to wait until my birthday though.

    Rachel - wow, lucky you living so close! Thanks for warning me that not so much is on dsplay, that often disappoints me in an NT place.

    Escaping - I am a big fan of visiting country houses too which was another reason why I was so keen to go to the talk!

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  9. This sounds like a really fascinating book, I love learning about old houses like that. I have never heard of a calendar house before, what a lovely idea!

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  10. This is one that I haven't heard about, thanks for the heads up! Off to check my library catalogue...

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  11. Hi Verity, sorry so late to the party on this, is mid-winter in Adelaide and associated childhood illness keeping me on my toes...

    The prestigious Adelaide Writers Week had Nigel Nicolson speak recently, on his book Sissinghurst - a biography of the property and the story of his recent project to restore holistic methods to the farm, in conjunction with the Nat Trust. It is beautifully written, he is a gifted and sensitive writer (not surprising) and a very honest and moving speaker. I think you'd enjoy his book 'Sissinghurst', not to mention a visit to the divine gardens and home... His writing is so good I will be seeking out other of his works, particularly The Sea Room, about the islands he owns off Scotland.

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  12. Oh my goodness, how embarassing, Sissinghurst An Unfinished History is by ADAM Nicolson. (Son of Nigel.) Sorry, have lost the plot.

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  13. Merenia - no worries - I worked it out :) I have had that book on my want to read list for a while, and I have reserved The sea room at the library as it sounds fascinating! I hope the illnesses are recoverig and mid winter isn't too grim.

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