Wiltshire: Some Literary Connections

A look at some well-known writers associated with the county

Wiltshire is the only landlocked county in southwest England, stretching from Dorset and Hampshire in the south to Gloucestershire and Oxfordshire in the north. It is dominated by the chalk plateau of Salisbury Plain that separates the medieval city of Salisbury in the south from the market towns on the western side of the county and the industrial town of Swindon to the north that was largely created by the Great Western Railway in the 19th century. Wiltshire’s claims to literary merit lie with a select group of notable writers from across the centuries. These include:

George Herbert (1593–1633)

Generally reckoned to be one of the greatest of the “Metaphysical” poets (taking second place only to John Donne), in 1630 he became the rector of Bemerton, to the west of Salisbury. Although he had written poems throughout his life, it was during his Bemerton years that many of his best-known poems were composed, including “pattern” poems such as “Easter Wings” in which the physical arrangement of the words on the page conveys meaning as well as the words themselves. As…