.........being in the countryside?
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... where does this question come from?
I grew up in the country - from 1952 to 1971 before moving on to - abroad - university - London - abroad - London.
Very much a Londoner now, I have occasional urges to revisit the country. And it's lovely. For 24 - 48 hours. And then I begin to miss the carbon monoxide, the sulphur dioxide, and all the other good things that city life provides.
"Civilization". From "civis", a city.
Country - nice views, smells, "nature" [whatever that means]. But human beans belong in cities
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Do you have a specific reason for asking Lat, are you thinking of moving? As I live in the countryside it's difficult for me to answer, because I'm always in it! I wonder if the question is directed at urban dwellers. What I like is the openness, the mountains, not being crowded in, the close-knit farming community, moving with the seasons (again that references the farming world) the fact that everyone knows everyone, the friendliness. There are lots of downsides of course as vints says, lack of carbon monoxide being one of them!Comment
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What I look for most in the 'countryside' is the possibility of solitude and the intimation of wilderness, neither of which are available there in reality. However, I know a few places which come fairly close, and yet are but a half hour or so's walk/climb from a main road. Not telling where, however.Comment
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as Hazlitt put it ["Observations on Mr Wordsworth's Poem The Excursion", August 1814]: -
"All country people hate each other. They have so little comfort, that they envy their neighbours the smallest pleasure or advantage, and nearly grudge themselves the necessaries of life. From not being accustomed to enjoyment, they become hardened and averse to it - stupid, for want of thought - selfish, for want of society. There is nothing good to be had in the country, or, if there is, they will not let you have it. They had rather injure themselves than oblige any one else. Their common mode of life is a system of wretchedness and self-denial, like what we read of among barbarous tribes. You live out of the world. You cannot get your tea and sugar without sending to the next town for it; you pay double, and have it of the worst quality. The small-beer is sure to be sour - the milk skimmed - the meat bad, or spoiled in the cooking. You cannot do a single thing you like; you cannot walk out or sit at home, or write or read, or think or look as if you did, without being subject to impertinent curiosity. The apothecary annoys you with his complaisance; the parson with his superciliousness. If you are Poor, you are despised; if you are rich, you are feared and hated. If you do any one a favour, the whole neighbourhood is up in arms; the clamour is like that of a rookery; and the person himself, it is ten to one, laughs at you for your pains, and takes the first opportunity of showing you that he labours under no uneasy sense of obligation. There is a perpetual round of mischief-making and backbiting for want of any better amusement. There are no shops, no taverns, no theatres, no opera, no concerts, no pictures, no public buildings, no crowded streets, no noise of coaches, or of courts of law, - neither courtiers nor courtesans, no literary parties, no fashionable routs, no society, no books, or knowledge of books. Vanity and luxury are the civilizers of the world, and sweeteners of human life. Without objects either of pleasure or action, it grows harsh and crabbed: the mind becomes stagnant, the affections callous, and the eye dull. Man left to himself soon degenerates into a very disagreeable person. Ignorance is always bad enough; but rustic ignorance is intolerable. Aristotle has observed that tragedy purifies the affections by terror and pity. If so, a company of tragedians should be established at the public expense, in every village or hundred, as a better mode of education than either Bell's or Lancaster's. The benefits of knowledge are never so well understood as from seeing the effects of ignorance, in their naked, undisguised state, upon the common country people. Their selfishness and insensibility are perhaps less owing to the hardships and privations, which make them, like people out at sea in a boat, ready to devour one another, than to their having no idea of anything beyond themselves and their immediate sphere of action. They have no knowledge of, and consequently can take no interest in, anything which is not an object of their senses, and of their daily pursuits. They hate all strangers, and have generally a nick-name for the inhabitants of the next village. The two young noblemen in "Guzman d'Alfarache," who went to visit their mistresses only a league out of Madrid, were set upon by the peasants, who came round them calling out, "a wolf." Those who have no enlarged or liberal ideas, can have no disinterested or generous sentiments. Persons who are in the habit of reading novels and romances are compelled to take a deep interest, and to have their affections strongly excited by fictitious characters and imaginary situations; their thoughts and feelings are constantly carried out of themselves to persons they never saw, and things that never existed; history enlarges the mind, by familiarizing us with the great vicissitudes of human affairs, and the catastrophes of states and kingdoms; the study of morals, accustoms us to refer our actions to a general standard of right and wrong; and abstract reasoning in general, strengthens the love of, truth, and produces an inflexibility of principle which cannot stoop to low trick and cunning. Books, in Lord Bacon's phrase, are "a discipline of humanity." Country people have none of these advantages, nor any others to supply the place of them. Having no circulating libraries to exhaust their love of the marvellous, they amuse themselves with fancying the disasters and disgraces of their particular acquaintance. Having no hump-backed Richard to excite their wonder and abhorrence, they make themselves a bugbear of their own out of the first obnoxious person they can lay their hands on. Not having the fictitious distresses and gigantic crimes of poetry to stimulate their imagination and their passions, they vent their whole stock of spleen, malice, and invention on their friends and next-door neighbours. They get up a little pastoral drama at home, with fancied events, but real characters. All their spare time is spent in manufacturing and propagating the lie for the day, which does its office, and expires. The next day is spent in the same manner. It is thus that they embellish the simplicity of rural life! The common people in civilized countries are a kind of domesticated savages. They have not the wild imagination, the passions, the fierce energies, or dreadful vicissitudes of the savage tribes, nor have they the leisure, the indolent enjoyments and romantic superstitions, which belonged to the pastoral life in milder climates, and more remote periods of society. They are taken out of a state of nature, without being put in possession of the refinements of art. The customs and institutions of society cramp their imaginations without giving them knowledge. If the inhabitants of the mountainous districts described by Mr. Wordsworth are less gross and sensual than others, they are more selfish. Their egotism becomes more concentrated, as they are more insulated, and their purposes more inveterate, as they have less competition to struggle with. The weight of matter which surrounds them crushes the finer sympathies. Their minds become hard and cold, like the rocks which they cultivate. The immensity of their mountains makes the human form appear little and insignificant. Men are seen crawling between Heaven and earth, like insects to their graves. Nor do they regard one another more than flies on a wall. Their physiognomy expresses the materialism of their character, which has only one principle - rigid self-will. They move on with their eyes and foreheads fixed, looking neither to the right nor to the left, with a heavy slouch in their gait, and seeming as if nothing would divert them from their path. We do not admire this plodding pertinacity, always directed to the main chance. There is nothing which excites so little sympathy in our minds as exclusive selfishness. - If our theory is wrong, at least it is taken from pretty close observation, and is, we think, confirmed by Mr. Wordsworth's own account."Last edited by vinteuil; 28-11-11, 17:03.Comment
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Well vints, that 'as do put us yokels fair 'n square in ower places! <bows and scrapes whilst touching forelock under dimity bonnet and wiping snotty nose on sleeve of calico smock>Comment
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The relatively fresh air and sense of space; village architecture including old churches; hedgerows, field margins and all that grows and lives in them (where the farmer permits their existence); the scent of cornfields, before and after harvest; peace and quiet (when not interrupted by low-flying aircraft); rural accents and dialects (where still extant); the comparative absence of traffic lights... erm...Originally posted by Lateralthinking1 View Post
Oh, and country pubs - another dying breed - especially those with gardensLast edited by Serial_Apologist; 28-11-11, 17:18.Comment
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As an urban dweller, I get most of these benefits in the part of London where I live - apart from mountains of course, and the close-knit farming community, whatever that means...Originally posted by Anna View Post
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Well, I have to say that this really strikes me as the most peculiar representation of any Welsh-accented English speech as I've ever encountered!Originally posted by Anna View Post
Oh - and please don't bow and scrape (although what you choose to do with your forelock in private is presumably your personal prerogative); apart from their being not the slightest need to do either, it's surely conduct unbecoming for any - let alone one of the most distinguished - of the Ladies of Powys.Comment
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Gosh Mr. Hinton, you make me out to be quite notorious with your description, a regular Gossamer Beynon!Originally posted by ahinton View Post
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I will have it, you must watch these old moguls, you know, young Gossamer.Originally posted by Anna View PostGosh Mr. Hinton, you make me out to be quite notorious with your description, a regular Gossamer Beynon!Comment
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Why ask? I don't want to ruin it by suggesting thoughts but you go walking......some enjoy labelling what they see or describing how nature works, some enjoy the sensations, some are worried about slipping or getting wet or when they might find a pub, some spend their whole time talking about cricket or the fifty best composers or what they have seen on TV.
There really are no right or wrong answers so it is good in that way but I think it can tell us a lot.Comment
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Are they related to the Ladies of Llangollen? http://chinafairings.org/gallery/p7018270.jpgOriginally posted by ahinton View Post
What do I like about being in the countryside?
Hmm - depends - on how long I'm there, what the weather's like, what countryside. Open views, green stuff, sound of birds, babbling brooks - in the sun. If it's pouring down with rain, & blowing a gale, then there's nothing really I like.
(I emphasised 'being in' because being in it is vastly different to having a general idea about the countryside.)Comment
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