Travelogue England April-May 2023: Sissinghurst

We made a few outings from Dixter during the first few days we spent in England on our own.  I’ll attempt to describe them here, though neither my nerves nor my patience extend to the point of contemplating a career as a dedicated travel writer.  Too many words and facts to keep track of.  And far too many pictures to fuss with. 

But I would be failing in my duty to my future self, who is unlikely to remember any of this, if I did not at least catalog some of the details.  So here goes.

For me, Sissinghurst garden was the most captivating locale, aside from Dixter.  It had a tall brick tower to climb to Vita Sackville-West’s private reading and writing chamber, somewhat reminiscent of the tall towers in old towns in Italy.  From the top, you could see the formal architecture of the neatly sprawling gardens.

These gardens on closer inspection were resplendent with tumbling tulips and herbs and even desert plants.  Classical statues stood at either end of a few gardens, staring longingly down a walkway or across a thicket of small trees and wildflowers at each other. 

Pots were placed at critical junctions and overflowed with blooms.  Walls hosted blooming vines and promised more to come, as budded branches splayed nakedly up the brick.  The rows and rows of roses were cut back and ready to burst forth in June, but in late April it was too early yet. 

We had a lovely sunny morning at Sissinghurst.  While my daughter searched the garden to catalog what was new since her last visit, my husband and I found many benches to sit on.  One allowed us to brazenly stare at a marble, diaphanously-dressed young women, who seemed to be vainly attempting modesty in the far too thin spring foliage. 

Another bench let one observe  textures one rarely sees in Florida, like brick garden walls with paneless windows set into them, and fritillary tulips sidling up to water spigots.  And sheep, of course.

During this Pride Month, it is worth learning a little about Vita Sackville-West, a member of the Bloomsbury group, who created this garden.  Well before such things were widely accepted, she practiced an eclectic, bohemian  lifestyle, with various sexual liasons, including her romance with novelist Virginia Woolf, and her marriage of convenience to a wealthy, landed gay man.  As well as being a gardener she was a woman of letters and published many books.   I read some of her poetry in a little book (The Land) tucked away in the Dixter bedroom library.  I found this lovely phrase, describing the lure of the outdoors:

          The country habit has me by the heart

Vita Sackville-West, The Land.

Another section described The Yeoman, who was apparently something like what we would call a small farmer, a person who farms for himself, mostly.  He is held up here romantically, if somewhat patronizingly, as symbol and as myth:

His mind is but the map of his estate

No broader than his acres, fenced and bound

Within the little England of his ground

Squared neat between the hedgerows of his brain

Vita Sackville-West, The Land.

She goes on to describe the yeoman’s attitude:

All this he sees and nothing sees beyond

The limits and the fealty of his lease(…)

And in his calling takes a stubborn pride

That nature still defeats

The frowsty science of the cloistered men

Their theory, their conceits.

Vita Sackville-West, The Land.

I sensed a very different attitude toward gardens in England, than in our own sunny climes.  Here, my mother always described Nature as a beast to be fought against, to be kept outside the door and in its place.  She endlessly swept the driveway free of magnolia leaves and chastised me for pulling leaves from the pool and placing them on the rim, which had just been swept. 

It was a constant battle against insects, dust, weeds and fungal blight.  Nature will take over without much enticement, in Florida.  Many a fine house or property has succumbed to greenery which, if unopposed, will rapidly reclaim its rightful place. 

Perhaps in England the depravity or rather deprivation of winter led to other attitudes, like appreciation, attention to detail, and enthusiasm for the gifts of this short but riotous season.  Apparently South England especially has this outlook, with its kinder climate.  There, winters are less harsh, on account of the Gulf Stream (Florida says, you’re welcome!)

Thank you to Sissinghurst, for the lovely tulip display and for inspiring the words of its most famous resident. I hope my readers will also have a chance to walk through your doors, tread your paths and peer around your corners as they explore these beautiful grounds, themselves.

Copyright 2023 Andrea LeDew.

To see other posts in this series about our trip to England, begin with Introduction. To see posts about more controversial statues, see Statues and Death and Other Ailments. For more on Pride Month read Wishful Thinking and Ampersands.