The Countryside Ideal: Anglo-America Landscape

209 Pages·1994·3.07 MB·English

by  Michael Bunce

THE COUNTRYSIDE IDEAL
One of the contradictions of modern urban civilisation is the persistence of a nostalgia for
rural life and landscape which has raised the countryside to an idealised status. So far the
discussion of this phenomenon has been restricted to the relatively narrow perspectives of
literary and intellectual history. This book broadens the analysis of the countryside ideal
by exploring the relationships between its cultural origins and its manifestation in
contemporary landscapes.
The Countryside Ideal examines the main historical processes and ideas underlying the
continuing attachment to the countryside, and how these have influenced popular values
and lifestyles, defined attitudes to nature, country life and landscape, and affected the
development of rural and urban landscapes. The cultural geographical framework
recognises the particular strength of the countryside ideal in Anglo-American culture, and
explores the similarities and differences in its British and North American expression.
This book draws together diverse images of landscape to explore this preoccupation
with place, culture and representation in Anglo-American society.
Michael Bunce is Associate Professor of Geography at Scarborough College, University
of Toronto, Canada.

THE COUNTRYSIDE IDEAL
Anglo-American Images of Landscape
Michael Bunce

London and New York
First published 1994 by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane London EC4P 4EE
This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2005.

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© Michael Bunce
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilized in any form or
by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including
photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission
in writing from the publishers.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from
the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Bunce, M.F. The countryside ideal: Anglo-
American images of landscape/Michael Bunce p. cm. Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and
index. 1. Great Britain-Historical geography. 2. United States-Historical geography. 3. Landscape-
Great Britain-Historiography. 4. Landscape-United States-Historiography. 5. Ideals (Aesthetics) I.
Title DA600.B79 1994 911′.41–dc20 93–33662 CIP
ISBN 0-203-97370-4 Master e-book ISBN
ISBN 0-415-10434-3 (Print Edition)
0-415-10435-1 (pbk)
To my parents
CONTENTS

List of plates vii
Preface x
Acknowledgements xii

INTRODUCTION 1
1 THE MAKING OF AN IDEAL 4
2 THE ARMCHAIR COUNTRYSIDE 30
3 A PLACE IN THE COUNTRY 62
4 THE PEOPLE’S PLAYGROUND 89
5 THE COUNTRY IN THE CITY 113
6 THE COUNTRYSIDE MOVEMENT 141
7 REFLECTIONS 166

Suggested further reading 171
Bibliography 174
Index 182
PLATES

1.1 London going out of Town—or—the March of Bricks and 13

Mortar, Thomas Cruikshank, 1827
1.2 A Country Worth Fighting For: British Second World War 17

poster
2.1 The American picturesque: View on the Catskill, Early Autumn 35

by Thomas Cole, 1837
2.2 The old order of rural England: The Cornfield by John 42

Constable, 1826
2.3 The mid-Victorian rural idyll: Cottage at Shere by Helen 44

Allingham, 1856
2.4 Beatrix Potter’s Peter Rabbit: setting the animal theme in 53

children’s literature for generations to come
2.5 ‘It was a Simpler, Gentler Time and Place’: nostalgia in 59

ornamental china
2.6 The marketing of pastoral purity: Horlicks’ advertisement, 1901 60
2.7 Idyllic natural settings are used to market a variety of everyday 61

products: 1987 advertisement
3.1 The English country house: Wilton, Wiltshire 64
3.2 ‘Extravagant estates for wealthy tycoons’: the Biltmore Estate, 67

North Carolina
3.3 The purpose-built rustic escape: ‘cottage-country’, Ontario 72
3.4 Rapid turn-of-the-century growth in the dormitory settlements 75

of the Home Counties, from Greater London, ed. by
J.T.Coppock and Hugh C.Prince, Faber and Faber, 1964
3.5 The scattered residential settlement of modern exurbia: just 77

north of San Francisco
3.6 English thatched cottage, California-style! 78
3.7 The gate of success: late twentieth-century gentrification of 81

Toronto’s countryside
4.1 Railway Rambles poster, 1935 92
4.2 Discover the Countryside: British Rail/Countryside 93

Commission campaign poster, 1987
4.3 The joys of the open road, 1925 96
4.4 ‘See America First!’ Traffic jam in Yosemite National Park, 97

1912
4.5 On every city’s doorstep: National Parks, Areas of Outstanding 105
Natural Beauty and long-distance footpaths in England and
Wales, 1992, © BTA 1993, Licence No. 123
4.6 Regimented recreational intrusion into the rural landscape of 106

the Isle of Wight
4.7 Pilgrimage to Wessex: Thomas Hardy’s cottage at Higher 107

Bockhampton, Dorset
4.8 ‘The complete country experience’ at Bickleigh Mill, Devon 108
4.9 The educational countryside: pioneer hay-making at Old 109

Sturbridge, Massachusetts
5.1 A Summer’s Day in Hyde Park, by John Ritchie, 1858 116
5.2 Nature in the city: Southampton Common, 1993 117
5.3 Central Park today still stands out in sharp naturalistic relief 119

from the rest of Manhattan
5.4 Olmsted and Vaux’s plan for the garden suburb of Riverside, 125

Chicago, 1869
5.5 Norman Shaw’s original sketch for houses in Bedford Park, 128

London
5.6 Sir Ebenezer Howard’s ‘Three Magnets’ and ‘Garden City’ 129
5.7 Hampstead Garden Suburb: sketches for ‘medium-sized’ houses 131
5.8 Golders Green as Arcadian retreat: 1910 Metropolitan Railway 135

advertisement
5.9 Mock Tudor in modern suburbia. It could be any suburb where 136

it snows, but this happens to be Scarborough, Ontario
5.10 Reclaiming nature from urban dereliction: Camley Street 140

‘Citywild’ Nature Park, London
6.1 The village preserved and kept free of tourists’ cars: Castle 148
Combe, often claimed to be the most beautiful village in
England
6.2 Organisation of the British environmental lobby. Groups have 152
been allocated to different bands according to the number of
contacts attributed to them (from Lowe and Godyer 1983:81)
6.3 ‘God’s first temples’: Yosemite National Park, California 156
6.4 The first campaign for preserving the American countryside: 162

National Trust booklet, 1988