Wednesday is best summed up in three parts: Morning, Death, and Life.
MORNING
1) I went down to the breakfast room in shorts and a T-shirt for coffee and to write my pages at a table in the little back room. At the table closest to the entrance a woman was arranging a plate with three color-coordinated greeting cards and two or three flat packages; I figured it was for someone’s birthday.
2) And then I spent the rest of the morning in bed, writing, and brooding a little, and knowing I needed to do something on this unplanned day. When I found out that Isambard Kingdom Brunel was buried at Kensal Green, that settled it.
3) When I’ve gone out on almost any given day since Paris, I’ve worn my pen on a chain and carried my journal, a notebook, and occasionally whatever I’m reading. Today was no different, only I celebrated that the heat had finally broken by putting on a long-sleeved shirt over my T-shirt. The day was cloudy with spatterings of rain, so I left my sunglasses in my room.
DEATH
1) Getting out at the Kensal Green Tube stop felt like I was arriving in a little-used part of the city. The West Entrance to the cemetery was about a five-minute walk away. While Brompton Cemetery, which I visited a few weeks ago, is fairly bustling with people, Kensal Green is more like Forest Hills at home. There’s almost no one there, but you’re never really alone.
Old and new together — but must be mostly new, as they are all so upright.
2) A few things about Kensal Green. First, old and new graves are mixed together much more than I expected; I can only imagine that the office changed their criteria for open space, and some of them looked as if they’d been parked in former pathways. The contrast was a little jarring, glossy black or white granite with gold lettering cheek by jowl with grayed marble.
2a) Second, I don’t know if the ground is extra unsteady or what, but almost everything seems to be off-center or tilting one way or the other.
2b) Third, there must be an Advanced Decay setting someplace, because even graves of this century already looked like they’d been there for a century.
2c) Finally, like Brompton, the cemetery is letting some sections revert to “Natural Areas:” “This area has been left in a more natural state because the cemetery is working with various agencies to encourage wildlife and biodiversity in the grounds.”
3) With no map and only a vague idea that I ought to find the Dissenters Chapel, I wandered a bit until I found an arrow. Whaddya know, there’s HRH the Duke of Cambridge! Passing one mausoleum across from him, I was startled when half a dozen birds flew out of it! Then, walking down a long grassy path, I saw at the end of it a freshly mown space inhabited by a flock of pigeons. I will admit to having made one especially firm step to set them airborne.
4) A U-turn brought me to what I now know was the Anglican Chapel (acting and appearing as a ruin), where many of the pigeons I had disrupted had landed on the cornice . . . where they could eye me ominously. But I paid them no mind, nor the two workmen who had rounded the corner in a truck, continued down the avenue at the back and . . .
Princess Sophia, from the side. Note that big ol’ weed.
5) . . . and found someone I’d been looking for, The Princess Sophia, fifth daughter of George III. A few years ago I had read Princesses, a joint biography of all six daughters of George III. The king had not wanted any of his daughters to marry, and only one did during his lifetime. Sophia’s reputation was blackened by having given birth to an illegitimate child, and until just now (when I looked it up) I wondered if that was why she was buried here and not with the rest of the family. Turns out she wanted to be close to her brother, the Duke of Sussex, who apparently was buried on the other side of the avenue and who I missed entirely.
5a) Sophia’s monument sprouted some Weeds of Impressive Size. Someone ought to do something about that.
The full epitaph of John St. John Long.
6) Continuing, I found a most curious epitaph that sounded a bit like a slam. It concluded “Stranger, as you respect the receptable for the dead (as one of the many that will rest here), read the name of John Saint John Long without comment.” What on earth?! I just had to look him up; he was a quack doctor who falsely claimed he could cure tuberculosis, was brought to trial twice, and acquitted once.
Harold Pinter.
6a) Stepping behind Dr. Long’s memorial for more photos I found a beautiful white marble Orthodox cross carved in shallow relief, and then on the ground . . . wait . . . Harold Pinter, what are YOU doing here?! A flat marker flush with the ground, already aged with lichen (and he only died in 2008). “Playwright — Nobel Laureate — Beloved Husband of Antonia Fraser.” His location is almost as obscure as e.e. cummings’s grave at home.
7) My wandering had taken me to the Main Gate (I had entered through the West Gate), where at least I found a grid map of the cemetery that numbered all its sections. And showed me the true location of the Dissenters Chapel, where I went right away. And there was someone else I’d read about: Jind Kaur, Maharani of the Punjab, the grandmother of Princess Sophia Duleep Singh. (Remember I saw portraits of Sophia’s father and eldest brother at the NPG.) I knew she would be there, but it was still reassuring to have found her.
The Reformers Memorial.
8) I saw an obelisk with names inscribed all the way up to the top, which seemed unusual. That’s how I discovered the Reformers Memorial, “erected to the memory of men and women who have generously given their time and means to improve the conditions and enlarge the happiness of all classes of society.” Among other listed were Harriet Martineau, Beatrice Webb (but not her husband Sydney, as far as I could tell), John Ruskin, William Morris, and Elizabeth Fry. A beautiful and necessary reminder.
9) At this point I had a rough idea where to look from Brunel from Find A Grave Dot Com. As I walked along, I noticed that some new grave sites also included wooden benches (obviously not provided by the cemetery), and that several had a rosebush planted by them. While others were decorated with a profusion of silk (or possibly plastic) flowers, pinwheels, and large floral letters.
10) At last, I found Brunel. Because of his reputation and achievements I expected a fairly grand monument. But no, it was just a rectangular block of white stone, quite plain, with the names of his parents, himself, his wife, his oldest son and his wife, his youngest son, and his niece Lilian (who had been born well after his death). And on each side was engraved the name of a great-great-grandddaughter, the youngest of whom died in 2009. It’s a marvelous thing, a family plot.
11) From a cool gray day with bits of mist, the sun had come out as I continued. I had been observing the, shall we say, jumble of graves — not just because many of them were toppling over onto each other, but the different styles, languages (I saw graves in Greek, Russian, Chinese, Latin), and expressions. The informal “Dad and Mum” and “Granddad” were used quite frequently on newer graves. At one point I saw a 19th-century obelisk that had fallen over and broken, showing that it was a hollow column. The top of one side, “In Ever Loving Memory,” was nearly covered by ivy, and within a few years it will sink entirely into the earth. My entire visit to this cemetery underlined for me our common humanity, and that regardless of our individuality, we will all merge together in the earth, anonymous but to whatever spark of awareness our souls retain.
12) I sat awhile on a bench in a large pavilion memorial to a young Indian boy, fairly new, before setting off to find two remaining graves: Marigold Churchill and Wilkie Collins. The trek to find the former led me past roped-off areas with signs warning of Giant Hogweed, “a biennial weed. The sap can cause skin irritation . . .” That led to a bit of backtracking, but then I did find little Marigold, the fourth child of Winston and Clementine, in a large plot for one toddler under a large tree with low-hanging branches. (I learned today that Marigold was reinterred with the Churchill family at Bladon in 2020.)
The lavender is absorbing this grave. What a way to go!
13) The search for Wilkie Collins led me back over ground I had covered, to the Anglican Chapel (which the pigeons had already left). I found one grave entirely covered by a giant lavender bush. I rubbed a couple of the flowers between my fingers to smell the lavender, and saw the bees enjoying it as much as I. (I really must get some lavender at home.) But where was Wilkie?! Turns out all the paths on Gyygle Myps are not paved. I saw a well-mown grass path, said “Well, someone famous must be down there,” and the someone famous was Wilkie Collins, author of The Woman in White.
14) I spent another ten minutes or so rambling in a different section of the cemetery before leaving, the grass paths reminding me of Louisiana, and the discovery of the grave of a well-known gunsmith.
15) Was that man filming me on the Underground?
LIFE
1) I got back into my room about 5 PM, and made the mistake of lying on my bed. After arranging to meet Craig for dinner, I set the alarm for 45 minutes, which passed without me knowing it. Rising heavily, I took my time to put myself back together to head to his side of the Thames.
1a) And I brought with me only what I’m reading now, The First Celebrities: Five Regency Portraits, by Peter James Bowman, one of the books I picked up in Bristol. An appropriate choice, a book about fame and celebrity, after seeing the results of both in a cemetery.
2) Craig and I sat on his balcony over a glass of wine and talk about the future before we set off for a little Italian restaurant his sister has recommended, Legare. And indeed, it was wonderful: burrata pugliese, spaghetti burro, and a lovely bottle of red, and the staff were so lively and pleasant. And our table talk was lively and pleasant, too, and hopeful. Which we all need right now, wouldn’t you say?
Tower Bridge after dinner.
3) We walked along the Thames a little after dinner, and then it was time for me to get back on the Underground to my Final Hotel. Which leads to my final observation that it was the Night of Voluminous Skirts. At the table next to us was a young heterosexual couple. The young woman was quite beautiful, long blonde Alice-in-Wonderland hair, and dressed in perfect simplicity: a white cotton top that exposed a little midriff and one shoulder, and an enormous matching skirt that could have been a circus tent. The perfect look for summer; she must have been channeling the late Millicent Rogers.
3a) Then, walking to London Bridge station, I saw another young woman in a white top, wearing another very large skirt, this time of orange or coral with one large ruffle, and rising in a slight V in the front. I immediately remembered a ballgown one of the girls wore in the Cotton Candy Players production of Cinderella (in which I played the court magician). It’s so odd how things pop up in my head.
3b) Finally, on the Underground, another young woman basically wearing a knee-length white tutu over black tights, and a spiked bandeau in her hair, as though she was fleeing a punk Giselle.
4) I ended up staying up quite late, until 1:45 (!), and I am feeling it this morning.