Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #3983620 in Books
• Published on: 2000-02-01
• Formats: Audiobook, Unabridged
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 8
• Binding: Audio Cassette

Customer Reviews

In search of Arcadia
Adam Nicolson is the owner of the Shiants, a trio of small, uninhabited islands inherited from his father, and which lie in the Minch, that stretch of ocean between the Scottish Isle of Skye and the Outer Hebrides. No more peaceful place can be imagined, as Adam described in his book SEA ROOM. So, it's a bit of a surprise that Nicolson, yearning to escape the soul-numbing and claustrophobic sterility of city living, must seek spiritual renewal somewhere else. In PERCH HILL, that place is a semi-derelict farm on 90 acres that he and his wife purchase in the Sussex hills between the villages of Burwash (on the A265) and Brightling (some 2 miles to the south), within walking distance of Bateman's, once Rudyard Kipling's country home, and perhaps 12 miles northwest of Hastings.

As with any narrative by a British expatriate recounting life in a new and unfamiliar place, whether it be Tuscany, Andalusia, Provence, the Italian Riviera, or, well, the south of England, Nicolson entertains the reader with tales of ordinary vicissitudes. In Adam's case, it's the squabbles with a neighbor over an access road and utility lines, the turmoil of landscaping and building remodeling, the practical difficulties of raising chickens and sheep, the latter especially during lambing season, and the problematic eradication of the brambles and thistles that tend to overrun perfectly good fields. Perhaps the funniest chapter revolves around the diplomatic skills required for compromise when Adam is chosen to be one of three judges to award prizes for the best booths at a local fair.

On a deeper level, Nicolson considers the philosophical implications of trying to improve the condition of Perch Hill without losing the Arcadian essence of what he was looking for when he purchased the property in the first place, all the while bemoaning the fact that other owners of non or barely profitable small farms in the shire can sell out for exorbitant fortunes to moneyed dilettantes from the Big City that have no intention of carrying on with local custom. As Adam says, it might as well be Connecticut.

Nicolson is perhaps at his best and most lyrical when he dwells on the simple pleasures of the land that can be experienced on a summer day. At one point he and his dog lie prostrate in the grass of Slip Field:

"A slight wind started the field nodding and other butterflies cruised and flickered in. A pale tortoiseshell hung for a minute on the vetches, followed by a bumblebee which pushed its entire body inside the blooms. A big cabbage white flirted with the nettles and the balsam at the top of the field and then two brown moths, each the size of a fingernail, came dancing in a woven spiral across the hillside, as close in with each other, as bound to and as mobile with each other as the different parts of a guttering flame. ... A thin but unending river of feathery willow-seeds was blowing out of the wood, on past me and down towards Bateman's and Burwash. Here and there a thistle standing in the field was covered in the willow fluff it had picked from the passing air. ... I rolled over, turned my face away and down into the grass, buried my nose in the sun-warmed turf ... and knew that coming to live here was the best thing I had ever done."

A bygone age surfaces in this memior of a dream come true
I could not put this charming story of a metropolitan yuppy taking on a run down farm in deepest Sussex down. The gentle humour and wonderfully poetic descriptions of the very English and in parts very beautiful county of Sussex combine to bring this book to life in a quite unforgettable way. Anyone who has thrown caution to the wind to realise a dream will identify with the emotional highs and lows retold on the pages of this excellent book.

Inspiring prose from an extrordinary wordsmith
Adam Nicolson writes with a clarity that is overpowering to the reader.His descriptive passages are so precise they transport the reader to the rural utopia Nicolson has created. It is a charming tale of one man and his journey from town to country life. Although he writes passages which require more concentration from the reader than other books it is a very intresting read.There is something almost arcane about 'Perch hill'. Nicolson writes about the challenge of moving from the hectic London life to the quiet rural idyll which is the title of the book. As with his columns in the Telegraph Nicolson bears the ability to entice and persuade the reader and write with finesse and a unique form of panache. In this case he manages to draw the reader into the idea of the rural way of life and its pleasures. A charming and witty polemic against city life!