I recently had the opportunity to recreate part of the journey that Denton makes to Dr Easton’s house in A Fragment of a Life Story. Touchett (Francis Streeten) persuades Denton to see a religious film with him at the parish hall, but Denton loathes the experience. Overcome with “the horror of living”, Denton pushes his way out and makes his way down into the town of Tonbridge. He reaches the “great black station-yard where the trains were shunting and snorting”, but the station-yard is no longer visible from the road; it’s hidden by buildings and the road bridge. However, across the road, the library is still easily seen.
On the other side of the road, outside the public library, a youth stood, whistling mournfully and hunching his shoulders. When the youth glares at Denton for staring at him, Denton lets “the wind sweep me on at once.” He crosses over the train track and heads a hundred yards south towards Pembury Road.
I looked up at the spire of St Stephen’s Church. It appeared to me as a huge sharpened stake, put there by God for an instrument of torture. I imagined a gigantic body hurtling down from heaven and landing on the spike, pierced through the belly, the arms and legs spread-eagled and turning like windmills in their agony.
A policeman sees Denton staring, but Denton hates his friendly greeting and continues south to see the person he loves more than anyone else in the world.
I started to run up the hill, towards the doctor’s house… I pushed through the dripping bushes at the gate; one of them had an aromatic smell which I shall always remember, for, as I passed, I tore off a piece and crushed it between my fingers.
There’s no longer a gate, and, 80+ years on, I doubt that the bush on the left of the photograph is the same bush . A bolder person than I might have rung the doorbell and asked if it was OK to run round to the drawing room window and peep in, as Denton did. Maybe next time…!
Even all these years later, it’s oddly moving to walk in Denton’s shoes. Many of the buildings that he would have known still exist. Looking at them, knowing that Denton would have looked at them too, brings him a little bit closer.