Dymock Poets Cottages Walk

There are a number of walks, varying in length, set between Dymock and Preston on the B4215. 

The Dymock Poets countryside covers an area from May Hill in the south to the Malvern Hills in the north, most famous for its wild daffodils, which once grew in profusion in the meadows and woods. Despite changes in farming practices there are still many places where wild daffodils can be seen in late March and early April. 

May Hill is wonderfully mysterious. The clump of Scots pine trees on top of what looks like an upside down soup plate make the hill a visible landmark from all over Gloucestershire and Herefordshire.

Shortly before the First World War, three poets – Lascelles Abercrombie, Wilfrid Gibson and Robert Frost – came to live near Dymock in Gloucestershire. Three poets visited them: Rupert Brooke, John Drinkwater , Edward Thomas and Eleanor Farjeon. All the cottages that the poets lived in are passed on various walks, but they are now private properties. Their move to Dymock was a conscious decision to work in and respond to the English countryside, to seek a literary idyll. They produced their own journal, New Numbers. At the encouragement of Frost, in particular, Edward Thomas turned from literary journalism, to become one of the great English poets of the century. Frost himself gained a new impetus, while Rupert Brooke found Dymock and its occupants a fixed artistic centre during his world-wide travelling.

Robert Frost and Edward Thomas walked May Hill, and Frost and his wife could see it from their cottage, Little Iddens, which we passed on our walk. They referred to it in letters home. And it’s on May Hill that Edward Thomas began writing Words.

Glyn Iddens temporary home of Eleanor Farjeon

Littel Iddens the 1914 home of the Frost Family

the village water supply

There is a permanent exhibition about the Dymock Poets in St Mary’s Church, put together by local people. March and April a dedicated team women provide tea and cakes for travellers and walkers.