The Cultural and Literary History of Rectories

In a topic close to my heart, I wrote that village rectories, the traditional family homes of Anglican ministers, have a sad history. Although rectories have had their ups and downs since the early C18th, the period since the early C20th has posed perhaps the greatest challenge for protectors of church heritage. Real estate agents are, however, delighted. Old vicarages, all the defrocked plant of the Church of England, are in hot demand - these substantial and elegant homes propose permanence, stability and an evocative past.

The old romantic images return. For many the archetypal Georgian rectory nestling beside an ancient church evokes a scene from Jane Austen. For others it conjures up something much darker and elemental, such as the parsonage on the Yorkshire Moors where the Brontë sisters led such confined yet creative lives. In more modern times, we might think of Vikram Seth at the Old Rectory near Salisbury, where George Herbert lived, or Edmund de Waal growing up in the Chancery at Lincoln, home to the very creative Benson family a century earlier. In general we agree that these village homes exude serenity, restraint, civility and continuity; values that have a particular resonance in an age of anxiety and dislocation – and the romance endures, despite the clerical incumbents moving on.

Sir John Betjeman's former home in  Farnborough, Berkshire 

had been built as a vicarage in the mid 18th century.

Now a book has come out that talks not about the rectories’ archit­ecture and financial values, but about the long association rectories have had with writers in Britain. Deborah Alun-Jones wrote The Wry Romance of the Literary Rectory (Thames and Hudson, 2013). For her, as for most Anglicans probably, the British rural idyll was epitomised by the iconic mellow walls of the rectory. Sir John Betjeman's home (photo below) was even voted best parsonage by Country Life magazine for its exceptional architecture, beautifully-kept gardens and spectacular views over the Berkshire Downs.

Deborah Alun-Jones paired up eight English rectories with the authors who lived in them. Each chapter offered an architectural history of each rectory and a biography of each writer’s fam­ily. The authors were: 1] Sydney Smith, 2] Alfred Tennyson, 3] Dorothy Sayers, 4] Rupert Brooke, 5] John Betjeman, 6] RS Thomas, 7] George Herbert and 8] the Benson and de Waal families. Each chapter expl­ored the life of the writers during the time they lived at a particular rectory and the effect it had on them.

Life in the rectory was often creative and supportive, but sometimes the residents had to overcome great adversity eg parental psychosis. And the bitter, unrelenting cold. Nonetheless there was a common experience that created and nurtured talent. It says a great deal about the place of religion in English life, about the cultural consequences of having an educated and married clergy, and about the effect on the imagination of being simultaneously privileged and isolated, well-connected and poor.

I am not sure where the impact of the rectory was greater. Perhaps it was where the writer had been a child who grew up in a rectory with his/her clerical father (eg Tennyson, Sayers). Or was it where the adult writer chose to live in an old rectory (eg Brooke, Betjeman), perhaps because of the values that these houses symbolised. The Old Rectory in Berkshire certainly spread its magic on John Betjeman. He ran a campaign to revive and sustain local parish life.

Alfred, Lord Tennyson lived in his father's rectory in Somersby Lincs. 

It was built in the early C18th

In either case, it must have worked. Deborah Alun-Jones showed that the serene exterior of the rectory did indeed prod­uce a golden age of literature. Eight Poet Laureates, presumably the greatest writers and poets in the English language, were brought up such homes. The Bensons were clearly impacted! Their father EW Benson became Archbishop of Canterbury later in his career, and in the meantime the four children all grew up to be writers.

One reviewer remained unconvinced about whether Alun-Jones achieved her goal of proving that “these structures mirrored the stereotype of the national psyche: the cool, calm exterior concealing the turbulence and drama of the inner self.” Surely that was true of most homes, Lee Randall said; life inside a rectory was only as rich and varied, as good and as bad, and as creatively inspiring as life in any other dwelling? Probably true, but I still wept when reading of Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s really horrible childhood.

In 1842 Charlotte & Emily Brontë went to Brussels, boarding at the pensionnat run by Claire Zoë Parent and Constantin Heger. An unpublished homework essay by Charlotte, in French, on the subject of  L'Amour Filial/the love of a child for her parents was marked by her teacher, Constantin Heger, who left his corrections and comments. Hand-writing analysis has since confirmed the identity of the author.

What is the connection with rectories? A fund was raised on behalf of the Brontë Society from three different sources, paying £50,000 for the essay in December 2012. The essay's future home will be at the Bronte vicarage-museum in Haworth, West Yorkshire where everyone will be able to see the document on public display.

In June 1913 Constantin's son, Paul Heger, donated the four surviving letters Charlotte wrote to his father to the British Museum.