Property News · March 24, 2017

Petworth and Pulborough, West Sussex: straight out of Miss Marple


There are tile-covered cottages, porches draped in roses, enough wisteria to fill the Albert Hall and I swear I glimpsed the reincarnation of Joan Hickson What’s going for it? Was it the charming assistant at Hennings wine merchants? The shelf-stacker in the topographical section at the bookshop? I’m still hunting for Colonel Mustard and Professor Plum, but there are plenty of plummy-voiced antiques dealers in these towns to go on my list of suspects; let alone the rum fellows I imagine conduct their affairs behind the high walls of the illustrious stately home that run through Petworth like the Berlin Wall. These neighbouring towns are straight out of central casting for Miss Marple: tile-covered cottages, porches draped in roses, enough wisteria to fill the Albert Hall and I swear I glimpsed the reincarnation of Joan Hickson (still the definitive Jane for me), picking up a korma in Meghdoot’s (“Authentic Indian Cuisine Since 1950”). Petworth lives in the shadow of The House and its Titians and Turners. Having the railway station, though, Pulborough is the more worldly of the two, the kind of place I imagine lived in, in Agatha Christie’s day, by brassy secretaries with a taste for jazz and romantic dalliances with aged wealthy widowers who should know better.The case against Expensive. But you expected that, didn’t you? Too lovely for their own good. Coach parties. The looming walls of the house do rather make one feel like a peasant. Continue reading…

Source : theguardian.com
Read more…Petworth and Pulborough, West Sussex: straight out of Miss Marple

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