All the islands I have known become one island
whose Eastern coast spreads sandy arms
to welcome bathers and sea tortoises while,
in the West, a reef shreds the ships of armed invaders.
– from “Scapes” in Fledgling (2021) by Sarah White.
It being August – and mid-summer – one naturally thinks of escaping to the island – row out from the mainland to a place just one’s own. Haul the boat up over the fine shingle above the waterline. Camp beneath the pines, collect driftwood, build a fire to heat the baked beans and set about discovering gold ingots hidden by smugglers. There are no mosquitoes and when night drops, the stars come out, the embers glow red and you still have a tin of digestive biscuits to have with the bacon for breakfast. Watch the sparks leap as you carefully bank sand and thick timber at the edge of the fire to last the night. No sound but the steady lap of the waves in the reeds. Was that an owl? Glistening morning comes damp with dew, but the stones are still warm and blow on the fire and up she comes to brew the tea.
Here’s the four oldest Walker children setting off for Wild Cat Island in the ship with the brown sail, fully provisioned for survival, adventure, and exploration.
And the Famous Five heading for Kirren Island where there’s a ruined castle and a sunken wreck.
“They drew near to the island, and the children saw that there were sharp rocks all round about it. Unless anyone knew exactly the way to take, no boat or ship could possibly land on the shore of the rocky little island. In the very middle of it, on a low hill, rose the ruined castle. It had been built of big white stones. Broken archways, tumbledown towers, ruined walls—that was all that was left of a once beautiful castle, proud and strong. Now the jackdaws nested in it and the gulls sat on the topmost stones.” – Five on a Treasure Island – Enid Blyton 1942.
The magic of an island! Brave new Utopias in the wine-dark sea, lake isles off the seacoast of Bohemia, along the scattered archipelago that stretches to the end of the world. Places of myth and monsters. The perfect retreat and escape. A place for mystery and murder. Crime writers love islands – especially islands cut off by tides or isolated by a sudden storm that halts the ferry and closes off all communication. Think Agatha Christie …
There was something magical about an island — the mere word suggested fantasy. You lost touch with the world — an island was a world of its own. A world, perhaps, from which you might never return. – Dr. Armstrong in And Then There Were None, (1939) – Agatha Christie
Best of an island is once you get there—you can’t go any farther … you’ve come to the end of things. General Macarthur in And Then There Were None, (1939) Agatha Christie
…and P.D James whose Combe Island (The Lighthouse, 2005) inhabitants are trapped with a ruthless killer in their midst while the chief detective on the case – Adam Dalgleish – is stricken with a deadly virus and quarantined.
Immigrants arriving in the Port of New York in the 1870s who were suspected of carrying diseases were isolated and treated on two islands created for the purpose in the city’s Lower Bay off Staten Island.
In WW1, Hoffman served as a military hospital for soldiers with venereal disease, and during WW2 it was used as a training school for merchant seamen. Today, both islands are off-limits to the public and serve as the base for seals and wading birds.
Islands – places of solitude, desolation, and punishment. Think Robinson Crusoe, Alcatraz, Devil’s Island and Napoleon. Places where social norms no longer apply or holy hell can break loose. Think Lord of the Flies, and where evil genius thrives on The Island of Dr. Moreau and Crab Key – home of the Bond villain Dr. No.
Oh dear – I seem to have down a dark tunnel. So let’s cheer up and think on: Ah! here’s Shakespeare on Brexit and backs against the wall fighting on the beaches etc.
This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle,This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,This other Eden, demi-paradise,This fortress built by Nature for her selfAgainst infection and the hand of war,This happy breed of men, this little world,This precious stone set in a silver seaWhich serves it in the office of a wallOr as a moat defensive to a house,Against the envy of less happier lands,This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England,– John O’ Gaunt in Shakespeare’s Richard II
Geographically Great Britain is actually an archipelago of some 5,000 or so islands. Plenty to go around and most of them not English.
“One can hardly tell which is the sea and which is the land,” said Prue in To the Lighthouse –Virginia Woolf (1927)
What are all your islands? And what do they mean to you?
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It's not even August and i feel it! how wonderfully you express this inner yearning for something so simple and basic:
"It being August – and mid-summer – one naturally thinks of escaping to the island – row out from the mainland to a place just one’s own. Haul the boat up over the fine shingle above the waterline. Camp beneath the pines, collect driftwood, build a fire to heat the baked beans and set about discovering gold ingots hidden by smugglers. There are no mosquitoes and when night drops, the stars come out, the embers glow red and you still have a tin of digestive biscuits to have with the bacon for breakfast. Watch the sparks leap as you carefully bank sand and thick timber at the edge of the fire to last the night. No sound but the steady lap of the waves in the reeds. Was that an owl? Glistening morning comes damp with dew, but the stones are still warm and blow on the fire and up she comes to brew the tea"
Hello, I'm new to your blog and have come over from Paula and Winding up the week. Thank you for all these lovely posts on islands and Tove Jansson!
Welcome, Jane - hard to beat that indefatigable Paula at her book jottings! What a reliable resource of weekly wonders she is. And Tove is always a treat.
I wrote about literary islands recently (https://wp.me/s2oNj1-islet) so I won't repeat myself. However I'd like to mention one of my favourite real islands, Lundy in the Bristol Channel, which I visited a few years ago and walked around in the day available, a magical place. Also, I should add Hong Kong, where as a kid I lived in the 1950s; though the memories are now really starting to fade I've at least started to write up what I can bring to mind.
Never been to Hong Kong but I have been to Lundy meaning (name from Norse for puffin). It was a family caravan holiday at Croyde Bay in 1960. We took a bus to Ilfracombe and then the boat to Lundy. There was a post office with puffin stamps. I remember feeling rather pleased with myself on the trip back when the sea got up, and I was one of the few people who did not feel sick. The island fueled quite a lot of my childhood fantasy adventures.
When I went to Lundy in the 1990s on my own very little must have changed since you were there: I was particularly intrigued by the Dark Age memorials as as I remember in the late 1960s reading a paper or two about them by Charles Thomas, a distinguished Cornish archaeologist---I think I have them still.
I love islands. How could I not, I'm British! I am fortunate to have lived and worked on islands, and some not quite islands such as Gibraltar when the Spanish border was closed. I lived on Bahrain, Benbecula, Hirta (St Kilda), Ireland and have been totally alone on The Monarch Islands. Some stories exist on my blog, some are yet to be written!
The Monach Islands seem like something that belong in the well-beloved UK shipping forecast but don't. I shall have to search for your island stories on your blog.
A great post, Josie! I never read Swallows and Amazons but I read my first adult book at the age of 11/12 years of age and its impact is still with me at 71 1/2 years! The book was among all the hundreds of music books my father used; music scores, biographies, encyclopedias. I've written poems about it, made drawings and prints and still it fascinates me! The book? Thor Heyerdahl's The Kon-Tiki Expedition! Ok, it's about the journey, and what an amazing one too, but it is also about arriving on an island, and it was real life, not imaginary! I must check out The Summer Book that you mention; it sounds interesting. This summer I read Philip Marsden's The Summer Isles which is a real-life adventure but also one of imagination. PS. I'm not a sailor in real life but a sailor in my dreams! (Wow! A discovery about myself, at my age!)
My parents had that book too! And I remember all the photos of the stones on Easter Island. Your comment made me curious enough to go read the Wikipedia entry. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kon-Tiki_expedition. Sounds like Heyerdahl’s theory has been discredited. However – that journey was still amazing whatever it showed or did not show about Polynesians.
No man is an island..but connecting with others is a skill...and connecting with oneself the best first step before trying other shores of unknown safety..
Very gnomic!
a really enjoyable romp through the literature of islands, a topic that has always interested me. One day I will write a story about an island and a poem and post it. You have inspired me; thanks :)
And that - johnlmalone - is something I look forward to!
It's a rich reality - and metaphor - that is for sure.
These children's books look terrific. I am a big fan of E Nesbit books, but I do not know the ones you highlight in this blog post. Hurrah for island getaways — even in one's imagination! I also appreciate your wry reflections on the challenges of insularity...
Hi Will - E. Nesbitt and her Bastable children of "The Story of the Treasure Seekers" is almost a prototype for children's adventure fiction of a certain era. She certainly influenced Arthur Ransome and C.S. Lewis. And Edward Eager referenced the Bastables in his "Half Magic" series.
Islands - love 'em and then you have to leave 'em to love 'em again.