Writers on the Riviera Naturally inspiring Top tips Enjoyed this trail? Find out more at www.englishriviera.co.uk Take a literary tour around the ‘How do I love thee, let me count The English Riviera was the place to and www.englishrivierageopark.org.uk English Riviera and uncover the the ways?’, the occult, Bovril, a Prime live the highlife in Victorian times, For years to aid inspiration, places and stories of the greatest Minister, the scandal that brought but did you know that this area I’ve“ been walking local Look up or you’ll writers of all time, who, for the LGBTQ+ to the media, the UK’s is built on the very foundation of stretches of the South West miss the stunning past 200 years, have flocked to answer to Stephen King, and a roller- civilisation. A mind-bending 400 Coast Path, swimming and the English Riviera. Sent on skating nurse who would become million years of our extraordinary architecture doctor’s orders, to relax in our the best-selling novelist of all time. world evolved right here beneath kayaking the coves and warm climate, to promenade with your feet. Here tropical seas frothed, beaches near my home in the well-heeled, debate with the Use this map to uncover the places scorched desert winds blew, and and exploring the greatest minds and to be inspired our literary heroes frequented and the very earliest man scraped out closest estuaries and rivers. by the stunning coastline. They walk the streets, beaches and cliff an existence. Now recognised with What never fails to surprise Stop and enjoy the came and they left their mark. top locations that most inspired their UNESCO Global Geopark status, we AGATHA CHRISTIE is a registered me is how the landscape, and views, they’ve been trademark of Agatha Christie work. You can head out on foot to celebrate, debate and share stories Limited in the UK and elsewhere. its flora and fauna, changes so All rights reserved Now you can follow in their many of the places shown on the and findings from the English Riviera inspiring people for illustrious footsteps and find map. The accessible central route that continue to define us today. dramatically here (as does its the indelible traces they’ve left. which is mostly on the flat (markers geology). Within a few miles I thousands of years Project design, illustration and production: Wonder Associates and Canny Marshall. 1 to 4 and C and D on the map) can walk from the sub-tropical With thanks to contributors: Dr. Kevin Dixon and Matthew Newbury Co-commissioned by English Riviera BID Co and Torbay Culture, 2019. shouldn’t take you more than an hour. to the volcanic and forbidding. Take the day to do the whole thing I’ve taken hundreds of with plenty of stop offs along the pictures and studied the light Enjoy a Cream Tea way. Make use of local transport or Did you know and atmospherics, the coast, drive to places further afield. See The Devonian is a geologic valleys, woods and open (the way stunning architecture, unforgettable period and system of the expanses, the skies, cliffs, with the cream views and award-winning heritage Paleozoic, spanning 60 million caves and farms, before trying attractions along the way. years from the end of the to define and recreate it all in before the jam!) Free Silurian, 419.2 million years ago, to the beginning of the my thrillers and horror novels. walking Carboniferous, 358.9 million By 2019, three of my novels years ago. It is named after have been set here - ‘Lost trail Devon, where rocks from this Girl’, ‘Under a Watchful Eye’ Listen to audio and delve period were first studied. Writers further into Writers on and ‘The Reddening’. As far Whilst you’re the Riviera online at as inspiration goes, as I exploring ’s on the www.englishriviera.co.uk. often say: the Bay provides. Find out more about our ” Seafood Coast, literary residents and visitors - Adam Nevill, local resident as well as other famous - tuck into locally and award-winning author. and infamous - wordsmiths Arthur Conan Doyle, Peter sourced fish Cook, T.S Eliot, Robert Louis and chips Riviera Stevenson, Rudyard Kipling and Aleister Crowley.

B Torre Abbey D Princess Gardens E Museum G Meadfoot Beach I Greenway House & The Pavilion Dame Agatha Christie While Agatha was growing up, Without doubt one of the most Home to the UK’s only dedicated Although Torre Abbey Sands and This extraordinary estate was the the Cary family still resided in popular spots for an evening stroll Agatha Christie Gallery, you can Corbyn Head Beach were the first beloved holiday home of Agatha 15 Sept 1890 – 12 Jan 1976 Torre Abbey and she was known in the Bay, the gardens featured in step inside Poirot’s study and lounge, to end gender segregation, Agatha Christie and her family. Now owned to have attended parties there. the crime novel, ‘The ABC Murders’. featuring furniture, books, pictures preferred to swim at the more by the National Trust, the house While many writers travelled to the Her love of South Devon saw her Today it is open to the public and These stunning pleasure gardens, and even the fireplace used in fashionable Meadfoot Beach, once has been carefully preserved and English Riviera for inspiration, the buy a holiday home at Greenway is the home of the International built on reclaimed land, were named the ITV adaptations starring mixed bathing was allowed here. contains beautiful collections best-selling novelist of all time is a in later life, which also served as Agatha Christie Festival. in honour of Princess Louise, the David Suchet. It remains a beautiful spot to visit, of books, botanical china and home-grown talent. Agatha Christie inspiration for some of her most daughter of Queen Victoria. With with the crescent of the Osborne archaeology, all accumulated was born into a comfortably famous stories. The prolific writer The stunning interior gardens also beautiful flowerbeds, exotic Torbay Other highlights include a Miss Hotel overlooking the curve of the by the family over the years. wealthy family in Torquay and wrote 66 detective novels, 14 hide a dark secret. Here you will palm trees and lawns; the attractive Marple outfit as worn by Joan coastline, with Shag Rock straight The house also boasts stunning spent much of her youth in the short story collections and the uncover the Potent Plants Garden, fountain (donated by the nearby Hickson, David Suchet’s Poirot’s ahead and Thatcher’s Rock off to features, including romantic resort, where she also served in world’s longest running play – an Agatha Christie-inspired display Torbay Hotel) is a particular highlight. famous walking cane and some the left. As a child, Agatha spent gardens spilling down to the River the Town Hall hospital as a nurse ‘The Mousetrap’. Famously, she has with a variety of fascinating plants of the author’s personal effects nearly every day of the summer Dart. The house features in three of during the First World War. The only been outsold by the Bible and that may kill or cure! Literary fans The nearby Royal Terrace Gardens, and first edition novels. Agatha’s at this beach with her sister Madge her books, dubbed the Greenway town and its colourful characters Shakespeare, having sold more than will love trying to solve the mystery known locally as Rock Walk, with father was a member of Torquay and nephew Jack. Collection - ‘Five Little Pigs’, ‘Ordeal certainly influenced her writing, two billion copies across the globe. of the missing story titles using sub-tropical Mediterranean plants Natural History Society, which By Innocence’ and ‘Dead Man’s with Hercule Poirot inspired by the Amateur sleuths are encouraged to the clues in the four garden beds. and an illuminated staircase, offers an later became Torquay Museum. Folly’. The latter was the very last Belgian refugees she met in Torquay follow in the footsteps of the Bay’s The house is also worth exploring, elevated and unrivalled vantage point Poirot episode to be made starring and Miss Marple based on her most famous literary daughter and as the four floors reveal over 800 to enjoy the entire bay. David Suchet and was filmed on grandmother’s friends, who were discover several of the places that years of history and art. location at the house. far more fussy than her own relative. were influential in her life and works. The Pavilion was once a thriving art F Royal Torbay H Cockington Thanks to The Christie Archive Trust nouveau style Edwardian concert hall One day we saw that a and theatre which attracted the most Yacht Club “ celebrated artists of the day such as The English Riviera boasts some of No visit to the English Riviera house was up for sale that I Sir Edward Elgar, Rachmaninoff and the finest sailing waters around the should be complete without UK and includes in its rich maritime spending a few hours in had known when I was young. A C Anna Pavlova. Agatha was a regular The Grand Hotel Princess Pier visitor and it was following a Wagner history the first modern day tall Cockington, a 450-acre country Greenway House, on the Dart, concert at The Pavilion, that Archie ships race and the 1948 Olympic park. The delightful chocolate a house that my mother had watersports. In her autobiography box village with its thatched This beautiful hotel with award- A favourite spot of Agatha’s for Christie proposed to the young always said, and I had thought winning views was built to resemble roller-skating with her friends during Agatha Miller. Agatha talks about the club, of which cottages, cream tea spots, pub a French chateau and wouldn’t look her youth, and built in the same year her father Frederick was a prominent (designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens), also, was the most perfect out of place on the Côte d’Azur. she was born. Take a waterfront member. Her father divulged that artisan craft studios, manor house of the various properties on some of the men would use opera and charming church would make Agatha spent her honeymoon night stroll along Torquay’s palm-lined the Dart...So we went over to here with her first husband, Archie promenade to the end of the pier glasses to try and spy on the women an ideal setting for one of Christie’s Christie, on Christmas Eve 1914. to watch the world pass by with swimming from the ladies’ only murder mysteries. As a child she Greenway, and very beautiful Archie, a qualified aviator with the fishing boats, sightseeing cruises beach at Beacon Cove below. loved horse riding through the the house and grounds were. Royal Flying Corps, came home on and paddleboards. country lanes, while she would leave from France. In her autobiography, Agatha also also take part in many amateur A white Georgian house of Roller-skating was very fashionable reveals how she almost drowned theatricals organised by the about 1780 or 90, with woods Today the hotel boasts an Agatha during the author’s youth and would whilst swimming here in her youth, Mallock family, who were friends sweeping down to the Dart Christie Suite furnished in a 1930’s cost twopence if you bought your which could have dramatically of the Millers and whose ancestors style, with a vintage typewriter under own skates. £1.7 million was spent changed the face of crime fiction had owned the stately home for below, and a lot of fine shrubs a portrait of the author. The terrace on the pier in 2018 to repair storm as we know it. Whilst the club is some 300 years. and trees - the ideal house, members only, you can get similar makes an ideal spot for enjoying damage and make the structure a dream house. a cream tea while reading your fully accessible. views from the lookout point. ” favourite Christie mystery. Thanks to The Christie Archive Trust An Autobiography Copyright © 1977 – Agatha Christie An Autobiography Agatha Christie Limited. All rights reserved. N 1 Mary Shelley 2 George Bernard Shaw 3 Elizabeth 5 Edward Bulwer-Lytton 30 Aug 1797 – 1 Feb 1851 26 Jul 1856 - 2 Nov 1950 25 May 1803 – 18 Jan 1873 Barrett Browning W E Torquay Marina Torquay Marina 6 Mar 1806 – 29 Jun 1861 Rock Walk Beacon Hill Mary was a novelist, short story The Irish playwright is the only person S writer, dramatist, essayist, biographer to have been awarded both a Nobel A poet and short story writer with a Edward was a successful poet, Torquay and travel writer, most famous for Prize for Literature (1925) and an career spanning 4 decades. Elizabeth playwright and novelist with an her novel Frankenstein. She married Oscar (1938) for ‘Pygmalion’. The wrote about industrialisation, impressive political career, serving poet Percy Bysshe Shelley in 1816. In 1897 play ‘You Never Can Tell’ was slavery, political leadership, religious twice in Parliament and going on 1817 the Shelleys holidayed in Torquay. set in Torquay. Bernard Shaw regularly controversy and the problems faced to the House of Lords as Baron Almost 200 years later ‘Maurice’ a visited the Hydropathic Hotel above by women in society. Of weak health, Lytton. Edward’s novels are the children’s story, set near the town, was Meadfoot Beach, now the Headland she stayed here for three years - in source of phrases including discovered in a palazzo in the Tuscany Hotel & Spa but originally the Torquay Beacon Terrace - sent to the resort ‘the great unwashed’; hills. The Torquay that Mary saw was residence of the Romanov family, on her doctor’s advice. Her visit in rapid transition from a small fishing the ruling Russian elite until 1917. turned to tragedy when her brother ‘pursuit of the almighty port to a fashionable resort. He appreciated drowned in Babbacombe Bay dollar’; ‘the pen is mightier just two miles away. She is than the sword’. The Torquay you see today began remembered for such poems as with the formation of the Inner No housekeeping, plenty Unfortunately, his name lives on in Harbour, replacing the dilapidated old “ How Do I Love Thee? of bathing, taxicabs to get The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest for harbour (completed in 1807). During “ ” the worst beginning to a nove, inspired this period the first town plan was around in, shops galore, and (Sonnet 43, 1845) and Aurora Leigh by Edward’s ‘Paul Clifford’ (1830): drawn up, using Italian architectural every sort of urban amenity. (1856). Look out for the Blue Plaque. ‘It was a dark and stormy night’. ideas. This area is where the majority ” of the town’s earliest buildings are to He also visited Vane Tower, a Grade II Edward had an in-depth knowledge be found. listed Italianate villa, constructed in the 19th century, supposedly for the first 4 Wilfred Owen of the occult. One of his most 18 Mar 1893 – 4 Nov 1918 popular excursions into the occult Mary was the daughter of writer American Ambassador to Britain. You War Memorial was ‘Vril, the Power of the Coming and advocate of women’s rights, can see the building’s red tiled roof Race’ (1871) which contributed to Mary Wollstonecraft and the radical behind the black nets of Living Coasts, Take a moment at the War Memorial, the birth of the science fiction genre. philosopher William Godwin who to the right of the harbour. a fitting place to mark Wilfred The word ‘Vril’ came to be associated described her as ‘singularly bold, Owen, widely regarded as one with ‘life-giving elixirs’. In 1886 John L somewhat imperious, and active of Britain’s greatest war poets. Johnston was looking for a name for of mind’. Writing from the perspective of his ‘liquid life’ beef extract drink. He his intense personal experience of chose a blend of the words Bovine the front line, his poems, including and Vril, and named the new beefy ‘Anthem for Doomed Youth’ and beverage ‘Bovril’. ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’, bring to life the physical and mental trauma Edward died at his Torquay home of combat. In 1911 he holidayed in Argyll Hall on Warren Road, having Torquay with his uncle and aunt, John lived there since 1867. Built in 1849, and Annie Taylor, where he spent his Argyll Hall became the Roseland time browsing in John’s bookshop, Hotel and is now an apartment block acquiring Colvin’s biography of Keats called Marine Palms. The house and making his pilgrimage to the occupies a prominent position here house in where Keats on Rock Walk and can be seen as had lodged in 1818. Look out for you head towards the harbourside the Blue Plaque from the Paignton direction. Painting of Torquay in 1811 before Beacon Terrace 1839 its expansion. (Source: Torre Abbey Museum, Torquay)

7 Lesley Pearse 9 James Joyce 12 Beatrix Potter 13 Oscar Wilde 14 Seán O’Casey 24 Feb 1945 - present day 2 Feb 1882 – 13 Jan 1941 28 Jul 1866 – 22 Dec 1943 16 Oct 1854 – 30 Nov 1900 3 Mar 1880 – 18 Sep 1964 Grand Hotel The Imperial Hotel Kents Cavern Babbacombe Downs St Marychurch

International bestselling author An Irish novelist, short story writer, Beatrix Potter was an English writer, Oscar Wilde was one of the most Seán O’Casey was an Irish dramatist 6 Alfred, Lord Tennyson 6 Aug 1809 – 6 Oct 1892 Lesley lives in Torquay. She was poet, teacher, and literary critic, illustrator, natural scientist, and well-known personalities of his day, and memoirist, living through Torre Abbey told as a child that she had too James is regarded as one of the most conservationist best known for ’The regarded for his biting wit, flamboyant turbulent times including the 1913 much imagination for her own important 20th century authors. Born No wonder that such a spot as Torquay, with its delicious Tale of Peter Rabbit’. The children’s dress and sparkling conversation. Dublin Lock-out and Strike (starving writer visited Kents Cavern in 1893 It was at Babbacombe Cliff – there’s Alfred was the Poet Laureate good. Clearly this imagination has in Dublin, James emigrated to the “ with fellow workers), the 1916 Easter Italian climate, and endless variety of rich woodland, flowery and many say it was the inspiration a Blue Plaque to mark the spot - during much of Queen Victoria’s now been put to good use with continent in his early 20s though his Rising, the Anglo-Irish War and the for her drawing of the entrance to where Oscar completed his plays reign and remains one of the most 25 novels under her belt! When work continued to focus on Dublin. lawn, fantastic rock-cavern, and broad bright tide-sand, sheltered Civil War. A committed socialist, Mrs Tiggy-Winkle’s house. She ‘A Woman of No Importance’ and popular British poets. Alfred she grew up, she worked her way He is best known for ‘Ulysses’ (1922) from every wind of heaven except the soft south-east, should have he was the first Irish playwright wrote after visiting the cave: ‘Lady Windermere’s Fan’. Here, Oscar excelled at writing short lyrics, through a number of jobs from a book that continues to attract of note to write about the Dublin become a favourite haunt, not only for invalids, but for naturalists. was joined by his lover Lord Alfred as in ‘The Charge of the Light nanny to dressmaker before, at the controversy and scrutiny to this day. working classes. Seán lived here in (Bosie) Douglas. Bosie was, according Brigade’. His phrases still pepper age of forty-eight, settling upon a James and his wife stayed at the Indeed, it may well claim the honour of being the original home ... I was pretty much St Marychurch for many years, long Imperial Hotel in 1929 at the invitation to Oscar, a “gay, gilt and gracious our language, such as career that would allow her gifts to of marine zoology and botany in England… exhausted“ when we found exiled from his native Ireland. The blossom: she became a published of Stuart Gilbert (1883 – 1969) an ” lad… He lies like a hyacinth on the New York Times suggested that “Tis better to have loved novelist. Lesley loves life in Torquay, English literary scholar and translator. – Charles Kingsley’s ‘Glaucus, or, the Wonders of the Shore’ 1855 it, but by dint of eating sofa, and I worship him.” Later, Bosie’s he wrote his own epitaph in the and lost, Than never to especially long walks on the beach. Stuart was keen to assist with a new cinnamon and the excitement father, the Marquis of Queensberry, last volume of his autobiographical She is known to frequent The Grand translation of ‘Ulysses’ after noting made allegations of homosexuality work, ‘Mirror in my House’: “Here have loved at all of going into a cave, ” Hotel, and in particular recommends some errors in the French translation. 10 Charles Darwin 11 Adam Nevill against Oscar. Wilde sued for libel, with whitened hair, desires failing, and “Theirs not to reason why, cocktails in the bar with panoramic The Imperial Hotel has fantastic 12 Feb 1809 – 19 Apr 1882 1969 - present day recovered. but lost. After details of his private life strength ebbing out of him, with Theirs but to do and die”. In 1838 panoramic views of the Bay! Hesketh Crescent ” were revealed during the trial, he was views, if you care to join her. the sun gone down, and with Tennyson was in Torquay, a place arrested, tried for gross indecency and only the serenity and calm he called “the loveliest sea village Charles Robert Darwin was a naturalist This is the man The Guardian called The dilapidated wooden sentenced to two years of hard labour. warning of the evening star in England”. He apparently “had and biologist known for his theory ‘Britain’s answer to Stephen King’. An door“ was flush into the Homosexuality was classified as a left to him, he drank to Life, no money for touring, nor did he of evolution, the process of natural award-winning author, renowned for bank. Outside an artificial crime at that time in England. to all it had been, to what wish for change”. During this visit 8 Charles Kingsley selection, and as the author of ‘On the the tensest, scariest writing you’re it was, to what it would be. 12 Jun 1819 – 23 Jan 1875 he wrote the poem ‘Audley Court’, Origin of Species’. He lived at No. 2 ever likely to read. ‘Lost Girl’ set here plateau or spoil-bank of The love that Hurrah!” There’s a Blue partly inspired by Torre Abbey. Institute Beach Meadfoot House in Hesketh Crescent. in 2053, is an utterly disturbing tale slate, overgrown. “ Plaque marking Seán’s This elegant Grade II Regency crescent of child abduction and runaway ” dare not speak its name home, but we suggest Charles was a priest, a university – Oscar Wilde in Babbacombe. ” The last lines described the scene was built in 1846. The Crescent is climate change. His novel ‘The Kents Cavern is an award-winning you raise a pint to him professor, social reformer, historian from the hill overlooking the Bay, now made up of The Osborne Club, Ritual’ was made into a film in 2016, attraction and a Stone Age home in a local pub. and novelist, best known for ‘The presumably Waldon Hill which is furnished holiday apartments and a supernatural horror which will to early modern humans. There are Water Babies’, ‘The Heroes’ and just on the hill behind Rock Walk. The Osborne Hotel. have you hiding behind your sofa daily tours where you’ll unearth ‘Westward Ho!’ He is particularly He said he observed “a star of in pure fear. Adam lives in the Bay the secrets of the Devonian and associated with Christian Socialism. phosphorescence made by the Darwin, whose epic work shook and is inspired by the South West Quarternary periods and find out Charles came to Torquay in 1854 buoy appearing and disappearing Victorian orthodox society to its roots, Coast Path. He loves to walk the cliff about the Great Victorian Excavation while his wife recovered from an in the dark sea.” Torre Abbey was arrived in the resort in July 1861. A paths, kayak and swim in the sea; all (Agatha Christie’s father had a hand illness which was put down to founded in 1196 as a monastery for sufferer of nervous ailments, he also of which help to feed his grotesque in that too!). Refresh and relax in the living in their damp rectory home Premonstratensian canons, now the chose the town for health reasons. He imagination! restaurant and shop. best-preserved medieval monastery at Eversley. Here Charles looked for stayed with his family for eight weeks at in Devon and Cornwall. Enjoy a specimens of marine life. Though Hesketh Crescent, but he stayed away moment in the peaceful gardens - he saw the natural world as the work from the resort’s rock pools. He spent find the potent plant garden inspired of God, he was enthusiastic about his time revising his great book and by Agatha Christie’s crime fiction - Charles Darwin’s new theory of preparing a paper on the fertilisation visit the museum, art gallery, gift evolution (unusual for clergymen of orchids for a scientific journal. The shop and cafe. of the time). Osborne Hotel has a restaurant, bar and Imperial Hotel 1928. © The Francis Frith Collection terrace with great views and a leisure club (it’s best to make a reservation). Oscar Wilde 1882 by Napoleon Sarony (The British Library)