Shelley's Cottage | |
---|---|
Type | Cottage |
Location | Englefield Green |
Coordinates | 51°25′59″N0°35′36″W / 51.4331°N 0.5932°W Coordinates: 51°25′59″N0°35′36″W / 51.4331°N 0.5932°W |
OS grid reference | SU9789171395 |
Area | Surrey |
Built | c. 1800 |
Listed Building – Grade II | |
Official name | Shelley's Cottage |
Designated | 17 November 1986 |
Reference no. | 1028923 |
Shelley's Cottage is a Grade II listed early 19th-century large cottage in west Englefield Green, Surrey, England within 100 metres of Windsor Great Park marking the start of Berkshire.
The two-storey cottage dates from c. 1800 and is built from red brick with a low-pitched slate roof. It has been extended with matching materials and in similar styles and today has a small garden relative to the average along the lane. [1] The cottage is in the west of Englefield Green, in a plot screened behind others and tall trees that is, at about 100 metres east, close to Windsor Great Park. It is in the Borough of Runnymede, Surrey which as part of Englefield Green which in the early 19th century formed the uplands of the extensive parish of Egham centred on a small market town 2 miles (3 km) east, today a suburban town. This neighbourhood was widely known by a lesser used name, Bishopsgate, in Shelley's time referring to the east gate of the monarch's own landscape park in southern England. [2] [1]
The cottage is situated at the end of an unnamed road that adjoins Wick Lane. [3] The road is believed to be private, its residents generally unwelcoming of visitors wishing to view the property, even for research purposes. [4]
It is named after Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, who lived at the cottage with his wife Mary Shelley ( née Godwin) from August 1815 to May 1816. [1] [2] The Shelleys were able to rent the Bishopsgate cottage after a revival in Percy's finances due to the death of his grandfather, Sir Bysshe Shelley. After a holiday in Torquay on a sheltered bay in the south-west coast, they came to live at the cottage. [5]
Little is known about this period in Mary's life, since her journal from May 1815 to July 1816 is lost but here, Percy wrote the poem Alastor ; and on 24 January 1816, Mary gave birth to their second child, William, [1] named after her father and soon nicknamed "Willmouse". In her novel The Last Man , she later imagined Windsor as a Garden of Eden. [6]
Egham is a university town in the Borough of Runnymede in Surrey, England, approximately 19 miles (31 km) west of central London. First settled in the Bronze Age, the town was under the control of Chertsey Abbey for much of the Middle Ages. In 1215, Magna Carta was sealed by King John at Runnymede, to the north of Egham, having been chosen for its proximity to the King's residence at Windsor. Under the Dissolution of the Monasteries in the early 16th Century, the major, formerly ecclesiastical, manorial freehold interests in the town and various market revenues passed to the Crown.
Clara Mary Jane Clairmont, or Claire Clairmont as she was commonly known, was the stepsister of the writer Mary Shelley and the mother of Lord Byron's daughter Allegra. She is thought to be the subject of a poem by Percy Bysshe Shelley.
Englefield Green is a large village in the Borough of Runnymede, Surrey, England, approximately 20 miles (32 km) west of central London. It is home to Royal Holloway, University of London.
Runnymede and Weybridge is a constituency represented in the House of Commons of the UK Parliament since 2019 by Ben Spencer, a Conservative.
Addlestone is a town in Surrey, England. It is located approximately 18.6 mi (29.9 km) southwest of London. The town is the administrative centre of the Borough of Runnymede, of which it is the largest settlement.
The Villa Diodati is a mansion in the village of Cologny near Lake Geneva in Switzerland, notable because Lord Byron rented it and stayed there with John Polidori in the summer of 1816. Mary Shelley and Percy Bysshe Shelley, who had rented a house nearby, were frequent visitors. Because of poor weather, in June 1816 the group famously spent three days together inside the house creating stories to tell each other, two of which were developed into landmark works of the Gothic horror genre: Frankenstein by Mary Shelley and The Vampyre, the first modern vampire story, by Polidori.
The Air Forces Memorial, or Runnymede Memorial, in Englefield Green, near Egham, Surrey, England is a memorial dedicated to some 20,456 men and women from air forces of the British Empire who were lost in air and other operations during World War II. Those recorded have no known grave anywhere in the world, and many were lost without trace. The name of each of these airmen and airwomen is engraved into the stone walls of the memorial, according to country and squadron.
Warnham is a village and civil parish in the Horsham district of West Sussex, England. The village is centred 2 miles (3.2 km) north-northwest of Horsham, 31 miles (50 km) from London, to the west of the A24 road. Other named settlements within the parish include the hamlets of Goosegreen, Kingsfold and Winterfold as well as parts of Strood Green and Rowhook. The area is in the northwest of the Weald, a gently sloped remnant forest in southeast England and largely a plain by erosion.
Frances Imlay, also known as Fanny Godwin and Frances Wollstonecraft, was the illegitimate daughter of the British feminist Mary Wollstonecraft and the American commercial speculator and diplomat Gilbert Imlay. Wollstonecraft wrote about her frequently in her later works. Fanny grew up in the household of anarchist political philosopher William Godwin, the widower of her mother, with his second wife Mary Jane Clairmont and their combined family of five children. Fanny's half-sister Mary grew up to write Frankenstein and married Percy Bysshe Shelley, a leading Romantic poet, who composed a poem on Fanny's death.
Sir Bysshe Shelley, 1st Baronet was the grandfather of English Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley.
Sir Timothy Shelley, 2nd Baronet was an English politician and lawyer. He was the son of Sir Bysshe Shelley, 1st Baronet of Castle Goring and the father of Romantic poet and dramatist Percy Bysshe Shelley.
Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus is an 1818 novel written by English author Mary Shelley. Frankenstein tells the story of Victor Frankenstein, a young scientist who creates a sapient creature in an unorthodox scientific experiment. Shelley started writing the story when she was 18, and the first edition was published anonymously in London on 1 January 1818, when she was 20. Her name first appeared in the second edition, which was published in Paris in 1821.
History of a Six Weeks' Tour through a part of France, Switzerland, Germany, and Holland; with Letters Descriptive of a Sail Round the Lake of Geneva and of the Glaciers of Chamouni is a travel narrative by the English Romantic authors Mary Shelley and Percy Bysshe Shelley. Published anonymously in 1817, it describes two trips taken by Mary, Percy, and Mary's stepsister, Claire Clairmont: one across Europe in 1814, and one to Lake Geneva in 1816. Divided into three sections, the text consists of a journal, four letters, and Percy Shelley's poem "Mont Blanc". Apart from the poem, preface, and two letters, the text was primarily written and organised by Mary Shelley. In 1840 she revised the journal and the letters, republishing them in a collection of Percy Shelley's writings.
The Retreat at Elcot Park is the second hotel from visionary British hospitality brand The Signet Collection, and opened in Spring 2022. Housed in a Grade II-listed 18th-century building located between Hungerford and Newbury, The Retreat consists of 55 individually styled bedrooms with magnificent grounds to match.
Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets. A radical in his poetry as well as in his political and social views, Shelley did not achieve fame during his lifetime, but recognition of his achievements in poetry grew steadily following his death and he became an important influence on subsequent generations of poets including Robert Browning, Algernon Charles Swinburne, Thomas Hardy, and W. B. Yeats. American literary critic Harold Bloom describes him as "a superb craftsman, a lyric poet without rival, and surely one of the most advanced sceptical intellects ever to write a poem."
Rambles in Germany and Italy, in 1840, 1842, and 1843 is a travel narrative by the British Romantic author Mary Shelley. Issued in 1844, it is her last published work. Published in two volumes, the text describes two European trips that Mary Shelley took with her son, Percy Florence Shelley, and several of his university friends. Mary Shelley had lived in Italy with her husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, between 1818 and 1823. For her, Italy was associated with both joy and grief: she had written much while there but she had also lost her husband and two of her children. Thus, although she was anxious to return, the trip was tinged with sorrow. Shelley describes her journey as a pilgrimage, which will help cure her depression.
Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley was an English novelist who wrote the Gothic novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus (1818), which is considered an early example of science fiction and one of her best-known works. She also edited and promoted the works of her husband, the Romantic poet and philosopher Percy Bysshe Shelley. Her father was the political philosopher William Godwin and her mother was the philosopher and women's rights advocate Mary Wollstonecraft.
Since the initial publication of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley's novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus in 1818, there has existed uncertainty about the extent to which Mary Shelley's husband, Percy Bysshe Shelley, contributed to the text. While the novel was conceived and mainly written by Mary, Percy is known to have provided input in editing and publishing the manuscript. Some critics have alleged that Percy had a greater role—even the majority role—in the creation of the novel, though mainstream scholars have generally dismissed these claims as exaggerated or unsubstantiated. Based on a transcription of the original manuscript, it is currently believed that Percy contributed between 4,000 and 5,000 words to the 72,000 word novel.
Charles George Beauclerk was an English politician who served as Member of Parliament (MP) for the borough of Richmond from 1796 to 1798.
Bysshe is a surname sometimes used as a given name. It has been said that it is a variation of the surname Bush.