Visiting Laurie Lee's Grave

Before going for a couple of pints of cider in The Woolpack, I went to find Laurie Lee's grave in the Holy Trinity churchyard across the road in Slad:

The Laurie Lee grave was especially moving as the Slad countryside that he loved so much could be seen in the background.

The back of Lee's gravestone contains the first stanza of his April Rise poem, although it's not really visible on the shot below:

                                                           If ever I saw blessing in the air
                                                           I see it now this still early day
                                                          Where lemon-green the vaporous morning drips
                                                          Wet sunlight on the powder of my eye.

Never realised that Laurie Lee was a talented poet, with him being more famed as a memoir writer, of course.

Up near Laurie Lee's grave, I saw a woman, in her 30s or early 40s, sat down, she was quietly taking in things, looking down on Slad village below:

Before leaving the Holy Trinity church graveyard, I took a last shot of Lee's grave:

This time taking in some bushes in the background.

Have just read that Laurie Lee was born in Stroud in 1914 and came to live in Slad village with his mother and siblings in 1917, with this move providing the opening of Cider with Rosie, Lee's memoir masterpiece, of course.

 

Cider with Rosie (1959), often used as a set English Literature text for schoolchildren in Britain, vividly portrays both the hardship and simple pleasure of rural life during Lee's childhood and youth in Slad.

Have also just discovered that Cider with Rosie took Lee two years to write, and with his earnings from the book, he was able to buy a cottage in his beloved Slad, as in the 1960s, he often worked in London during the week while returning to his beloved Slad at the weekends.

Finally, my travelling companion, who has read all Laurie Lee's memoir books, had told me that the magic of Cider with Rosie lies in the book's nostalgia towards the simple innocence of a now vanished rural world. This was the main reason why we had to visit Slad to pay our respects to Laurie Lee (1914-1997).

Slad greatly impressed me because, in some respects, it still resembled a village that had stood still in time.

The next blog will describe the wonderful atmosphere inside the Woolpack and the hobbling arrival of my travelling companion, whose rural bus had failed to materialise.