I think we did the film at exactly the right time - although we didn't know it then - because it captured a world on the cusp of very great change. M. Forster, [9] [10] was briefly involved with Patricia Highsmith, [5] [9] [10] spent time with the Nashes, and was part of the Bohemian world associated with the artists of the East Anglian School of Painting and Drawing at Benton End near Hadleigh, run by Cedric Morris and Arthur Lett-Haines. And yet Blythe does represent a way of life that has all but disappeared and Williams detects a gentle moral in his writing. M. Forster, and influenced by Forster’s work, his first novel, A Treasonable Growth was published in 1960. But Blythe, who has spent all his 10 decades living within 50 miles of where he was born, has also devoted millions more words – in history, fiction, and luminous essays and columns – to describe with poetry and precision not simply rural folk but the very essence of existence.

Next To Nature by Ronald Blythe – Book Review

When he reached 100, he was still well enough to sign 1,500 copies of a new compilation of his best Church Times columns. Myfanwy Piper, librettist to Benjamin Britten and wife of the painter, John, once said to me, apropos of some private matter spread all over public places, “There’s too much talk. I have heard of devotees of Blythe who use his writing as morning meditation, taking one of the short sections daily and focusing their full attention on it and, with hindsight, I perceive that to be a sensible way of approaching it; after all, the individual pieces were originally presented as short, separate essays, not as a collection, and the content is so beautifully rich and crammed with sensory overload that, like a luxurious chocolate cake, the smallest portion is a feast. At the Yeoman's House and At Helpston by Ronald Blythe: review", The Daily Telegraph, 23 December 2011.The book is regarded as a classic of its type [1] [16] and was made into a film, Akenfield, by Peter Hall in 1974.

Ronald Blythe at 100: ‘A watchful, curious and gratefully Ronald Blythe at 100: ‘A watchful, curious and gratefully

At first glance, it is dreamy; the colour palette pastoral and soothing, but it speaks deeper of the loneliness and harshness of making a living from, and dwelling, in the rural landscape, where tilling can be an upward struggle, and isolation from supportive community can take its toll. It's extraordinary that a book I wrote in 1967, which is a world away from us now, and a film made in 1973/74, can have such an amazing and very gratifying hold over people's affections.

All the charm, wonder, eccentricity and vigour of country life is here in these pages, and told with such engaging directness, detail and colour.