Kingston Maurward House, Stinsford — Knapwater House in Hardy's Desperate Remedies. [Compare a recent photograph] Source of photograph: Anniversary Edition of the Wessex Novels, 1920, facing title-page. Scanned image (2002) by Philip V. Allingham; text by Allingham and George P. Landow. [You may use this image without prior permission for any scholarly or educational purpose as long as you (1) credit the person who scanned the image and (2) link your document to this URL.]
According to the editors, many of whose remarks seem based on Thomas Hardy's Wessex (1913) by Herbert Lea,
Knapwater House, probably suggested by Kingston Maurward House, Stinsford, a village not far [c. 5 miles] from Dorchester, stands in a magnificently timbered park. Built of brick by a cousin of [Prime Minister] William Pitt at the end of the eighteenth century, Pitt had the whole house encased with a shell of [Portland] stone, fixed to the brickwork with copper clamps. The description given in the story [Desperate Remedies] that "the house was regularly and substantially built of clean, grey freestone throughout" is verified upon examination.
Bibliography
Hardy, Thomas. Desperate Remedies. "Anniversary Edition of the Wessex Novels." New York & London: Harper & Brothers, 1920. This edition derives in part from previous editions and the photographs of 1912.
Last modified 19 April 2024