The Poet's House

Not so much a house, more like a small shed. But it’s clean and dry. Rather like sleeping at the bottom of a well - windows high up in the wall, light filtering down.

It reminds me a little of the Katherine Mansfield memorial room at the Villa Isola Bella in Menton - small, viewless and without facilities. Holders of the KM fellowship were expected to work there during their tenure, but until recent improvements, that was impossible. KM’s companion Ida Baker, who had lived with her at the Villa, was heard to remark disparagingly, after its creation, that the room had been a gardener’s shed when they were there and that KM had never even been inside it at all. Now it is a shrine to Katherine Mansfield's memory.

The Poet’s House at Peralta has been, until this week, a store room. But with the hamlet filled to bursting with Irish guests for a sixtieth birthday party, every room has had to be pressed into service. The Poet’s House has been emptied of old furniture and I’ve just spent two days painting it out in the traditional white, blue and terracotta of Tuscany and then scrubbing the floor clean enough to take a mattress and a chair.

So here I am. It’s a bit of an expedition to the loo in the night and I’m borrowing a shower - just like camping! But there’s a tiny triangle of terrace at the back between the room and Neil’s workshop in the tower. I’ve put out a chair and table and it’s peaceful enough to write, with views down over the valley. No one knows why Fiore di Henriquez, who restored the ruined, abandoned, hamlet of Peralta, called this little shed the Poet’s House, but the least I can do for her is to write a poem in it and, if I can get it knocked into some sort of rough shape, I will put it up on the blog.

The Novelist and the Biographer

I’m staying at Peralta in a beautiful top floor room with views out over the valley towards the sea. I have a small table to write on and a kettle and a fridge - everything I need! Neil works in a tower room and sleeps in a tiny cubicle above his studio when I’m not here, oblivious to plaster dust, as well as the heat that leaches moisture out of the ground, burning every blade of grass and scorching the trees. Even at 1500 feet there are few breezes in August.

Fiore di Henriques, the sculptor who found Peralta as a ruined, abandoned hamlet in the sixties and restored it, intended it as a community of artists and writers. One small cell is called ‘The Poet’s House’ and she always hoped that one day a poet would come and write in it. Unfortunately it’s still a furniture store, but I live in hope of being able to get in there and write a few lines, just for Fiore!

But artists and writers do come here, usually off-season when it’s cheaper, to enjoy the beautiful scnery and complete tranquility. Neil is ‘sculptor in residence’ at the moment, and the Chelsea Art Club regularly bring groups of painters. Recently two young student sculptors from Goldsmiths have been here on a bursary. Writers who've used Peralta as a retreat include David Craig and Ann Spillard, Jan Marsh, TV writer and novelist Margaret Simpson as well as quite a number of American and Canadian authors.

Mary Rose Hayes is here at the moment, from Arizona, and it's been fascinating sharing experiences - publishing has been taking a knock in the states as well as the UK and our problems with agents and publishers have been much the same. Mary Rose writes what she describes as novels with elements of the erotic, romantic and horror genres. So far she's published 8 - some of them best sellers. Most recently she's collaborated with US Senator Barbara Boxer to write two political thrillers which I look forward to reading. Mary Rose spent quite a bit of time in Washington and gained some interesting insights into female political life there. She's currently writing a trilogy whose theme is how the tentacles of war reach down through the generations. It's being written backwards - the first volume set in the nineties, and the last one will be set during the second world war.

Mary Rose teaches creative writing at Arizona university and we decided, over a glass of wine, to run a creative writing course at Peralta in May - she will take the fiction module, while I will do the life writing and poetry. All we need now are students who can afford the air fare!

Up to my knees in sewage

Just spent the day in wellington boots trying to unblock the drains. We have a septic tank and the pipe leading to the soakaway, which runs across the drive, has somehow become blocked. After attempts to run a hosepipe through it from the manhole (why don't I have man to do this?) failed, I was forced to start digging up the lawn to locate the pipe. Several men stopped to ask me what I was doing - at a safe, odour free, distance - but I didn't get any offers of help. Anyway, I've cured the puddle in the drive, but now have a garden pond (organic of course!) full of brown water. Tomorrow I will have to have another go at it. I bet Antonia Fraser never has to do this! Consoled myself with the thought that I'm off to Italy for the weekend at Peralta (peraltatuscany.com) for an exhibition in memory of Fiore de Henriquez. Neil is putting all his sculpture out in the olive groves on plinths and I'm really looking forward to seeing it in this wild setting. Also looking forward to sunshine, unlimited prosecco and fresh air with a rather more attractive aroma!