Inheritance: The Story of Knole and the Sackvilles - Hardcover

Sackville-West, Robert

3.68

272 ratings by Goodreads

9781408803387: Inheritance: The Story of Knole and the Sackvilles

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1408803380 ISBN 13: 9781408803387

Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing PLC, 2010

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Since its purchase in 1604 by Thomas Sackville, 1st Earl of Dorset, the house at Knole, Kent, has been inhabited by thirteen generations of a single aristocratic family, the Sackvilles. Here, drawing on a wealth of unpublished letters, archives and images, the current incumbent of the seat, Robert Sackville-West, paints a vivid and intimate portrait of the vast, labyrinthine house and the close relationships his colourful ancestors formed with it. "Inheritance" is the story of a house and its inhabitants, a family described by Vita Sackville-West as 'a race too prodigal, too amorous, too weak, too indolent and too melancholy; a rotten lot, and nearly all stark staring mad'. Where some revelled in the hedonism of aristocratic life, others rebelled against a house which, in time, would disinherit them, shutting its doors to them forever. It's a drama in which the house itself is a principal character, it's fortunes often mirroring those of the family. Every detail holds a story: the portraits, and and all the junk which the subjects of those portraits left behind, point to pivotal moments in history; all the rooms, and the objects that fill them, are freighted with an emotional significance that has been handed down from generation to generation. Now owned by the National Trust, Knole is today one of the largest houses in England, visited by thousands annually and housing one of the country's finest collections of second-hand Royal furniture. It's a pleasure to follow Robert Sackville-West, as he unravels the private life of a public place on a fascinating, masterful, four-hundred-year tour through the memories and memorabilia, political, financial and domestic, of his extraordinary family.

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Review:

`The Knole house has been the aristocratic seat of the Sackvilles since 1604. This is the story of the house and its inhabitants' --Daily Telegraph

`Inheritance is less a love affair with a house than a rather unstarry tale of family squabbles and minor statesmanship, a history with little laughter and slim snatches of gaiety . . . [Sackville-West] succeeds in breathing humanity into Knole's forbidding Kentish stone. . . An appealing human history'
--Kate Colquhoun, Sunday Times

`A graceful and thoroughly researched history that freely acknowledges, without attempt at rivalry, its debt to a glorious predecessor: Vita Sackville-West's intense, romantic hymn to the home that she unappeasably adored.' --Miranda Seymour, Guardian

`Witty, English and crisp, with a poetic lilt that not only makes one want to read about Knole (whatever one's views on aristocracy) but move in. . . That Knole fascinated and irritated its inhabitants as much as any lover is vividly described, while those same inhabitants "left their smells and spores behind in the dust."'
--Sunday Telegraph

`On the evidence of his charming, tolerant and humorous book, though, for a Sackville he seems surprisingly well adjusted' --Lucy Worsley, Eastern Daily Press

`The author deals with his ancestors with candour... a very lively book... Robert Sackville-West keeps a light entertaining touch but he is conscious of the darker downside to what others might consider the unmerited good luck, the unearned status and esteem of inheriting a stately home.'
--Peter Lewis, Daily Mail

`It is the definitive modern account of a great house and family ... refreshingly retold with much new detail, anecdote and scandal' --John Martin Robinson, Literary Review

`Sackville-West rattles through his family history at a judicious pace, artfully avoiding getting bogged down in any one period'
--Matthew Bell, Independent on Sunday

`Sure to enchant and delight readers. The author pens candid, intelligent, insightful mini-biographies of the various residents, giving readers a glimpse into England's aristocratic heritage while whetting anglophiles' appetites to see Knole for themselves.' --Publishers' Weekly

`Inheritance is not only a family history. It is a contribution to the history of the English aristocracy.'
--Raymond Carr, Spectator

Book Description:

A fascinating memoir of an extraordinary family told through the vast, four hundred year old house, Knole

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