Book Room
NOTE: A Laptop/PC/monitor screen will give the best browsing experience for the Book Room, so do view from your main computer/laptop where possible!  
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If I had my way, every home would have a book corner or a book room - whether a Little Book Room as inspired by Eleanor Farjeon or a large space with wall-to-wall shelving and a library ladder (we can always dream...); or perhaps, simply - especially on a shoestring budget - a humble alcove, understairs space, or even just a special bookcase filled with beloved tomes old and new.  Of course the collection is never complete, and can be continually added to. Here, bookish piles on the floor are allowed within reason - but never irreverently!
      On this page you will find inspiring photos of some of the many book-filled spaces at Blackbirds, our 1970s home, along with excerpts from my recently released book of poetry, The Memory of Walls, and teasers from the forthcoming tome, the much-awaited Mid-Century Modern on a Shoestring, some four years in the writing, now awaiting publication. Some have grappled to grasp the concept of combining interiors with non-fiction narrative and even - God forbid - poetry: but these things come naturally to me and if you have not yet dipped a toe in the water,  I'd like to win you over. I know that some amongst you even recoil from poetry,  and frankly, I don't blame you: I have seen what it out there and have written my own despairing critique of the worst of the contemporary offerings (see my poem They Claim to write Poetry); but good poetry stirs the soul, and becomes a vital part of the civilized human experience in a way that is similar to music. Take another look!
       The snippets and extracts you will find here demonstrate and demystify a little of what my work has to offer, and provide examples of the mid-century modern interior as a style of living which can - and should - be highly individual, not just a bland copy of a mainstream trend, for it is critical that the home should be a  meaningful and authentic environment.
       So step through the front door of Blackbirds and after enjoying a smidgen of excerpts and bookish photos, glimpse a preview of my main work, Mid-Century Modern on a Shoestring,  where a semi-autobiographical non-fiction narrative meets interior design. I have included an extract from the book to convey the ethos which pervades my work and which helps shape my interior designs.  I hope that it will help you to create your own meaningful space too; for whether mid-century modern or otherwise, the principle remains universal.
     Welcome to my Book Room: settle yourself down in a comfortable chair with a cup of tea, hot chocolate, ginger beer, or even a glass of wine, according to whim or weather, relax and browse!

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The Memory of Walls
Far from empty
Are these four walls
Of bricks and mortar -
Don’t be fooled.
Do you not feel
The life between?
The life within?
The life still living?
For what has passed
Has left its print,
Voices still whisper
And laughs still ring;
Impressions,
Lasting,
As surely as if
On the walls,
Were the writing,
I was here.
I was here.
I was here.

​Excerpt from the eponymous poem
© Jana Synková

The End Room at 'Blackbirds': an old teak sewing-box makes a good side-table in the Little Book Room bit of this multi-purpose room.

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Here they all are
Safely bottled:
The old familiar
Creaks and noises,
Rustles and rattles:
Inerasable sounds
And voices,
Echoing
Echoing
Echoing.

      Excerpt, The Memory of Walls, Jana Synková

Found at a ReCycle Shop, this teak ex-library bookcase has sliding glass fronts and very sturdy shelves. It makes the perfect partial room-divide between master bedroom and Book Room in the ground floor End Room.

I'm always on the look-out for lovely new children's book titles to add to my vintage/childhood collection. Beautiful covers are a bonus.

£5.95 ~ buy me !

These Penguin Paperback Classics have been with me since my late teens, collected one by one and following me on many moves.

Some old favourites on a shelf above my writing desk in the Little Book Room corner of the End Room.

The long oak bookcase in the upstairs lounge at Blackbirds contains a huge collection of books collected over decades. On the bottom row are Encyclopaedia Britannica from 1968 which were in my childhood home.

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Rain,
​Wash away the encrusted red.
But preserve in amber,
Times to hold,
Truer than truth,
More precious than gold –
Never to grow old.


Excerpt, The Memory of Walls, from the poem, Rain to Wash Away,
© Jana Synková 

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The Book Room mid-century teak coffee table with Angie Lewin's 'Plants & Places'. The vintage honeypot is from the 'New Devon' Pottery. The sprig of angelica is from our herb garden at Blackbirds.

​Green, how I love you, green,
In the dark of holly,
And smooth skins
Of briny olives;
The soft, pale flesh
Of avocado,
And sculpted forms
Of pears d’Anjou.
And in the treasured sanctity
Of memory:
On larder shelves
In old Moravia
Laden with jars
Of pickled cucumber.

​Excerpt, Beyond the Pale (Collection not yet released) 
from the poem, Green, how I love you, Green, © Jana Synková

​Green,
I have found you in
The rippling swathes
Of waves of grass
On untrod paths;
The jade-tinged forms,
Washed up on shores,
Of sea-smoothed glass
On timeless stones.
And in the Hebrides
On mossy rocks
In hidden coves
At the edge
Of the world.


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Excerpt,  Beyond the Pale   (Collection not yet released)
from the poem, Green, how I love you, Green,
© Jana Synková​
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The beautiful mid-century blown-glass vase, with its soothing green transparency, was a house-warming present from a friend, and one of the first 'objects' to be placed at the property. Peonies will always be a favourite flower: on account of their pleasing fullness and delectable colours, but also because they grew in huge clumps in the front flowerbed of my childhood home. We have planted several varieties here at Blackbirds.

​This 'Book Room' corner of the End Room, is also my interior base for writing. The 1970s desk was bought from a neighbour for £10  and the Texas Instruments calculator (still working) with red LED was my school calculator.
     The bookshelves ('pocket' strings) are from Nordic Nest, and comprise a nice mix of old and new books along with some fabulous Observer Books which look best, in my opinion, without their jackets on. The mid-century  paperbacks above my desk always cause my heart to swell with nostalgia, the very sight of them taking my mind right back to my childhood and early teen years.
    The etchings are by local artist, Roger St Barbe, and remind me of the sea view we have here at Blackbirds even when I'm not directly looking at it. The spotlight is new from Ikea, but gives an authentic mid-century modern vibe, as does the polypropylene 'Robin Day' chair from John Lewis - which was a bargain £59 a couple of years ago.
    At this very desk, I completed my manuscript for Mid-Century Modern on a Shoestring (awaiting publication) along with my recently-released title,  The Memory of Walls, my first collection of poems. Here too, I am working on my second collection, Beyond the Pale. Poetry was my first love, and is providing  escapism whilst I go through the rather stressful process of submitting proposals to literary agents. 

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...
​But the heart swells
In spite of itself,
And remembers:
Here we ate,
And here we sat;
In this wall
Was a serving hatch.
I still hear the clatter
Of cutlery and plates;
The door slamming
Where the draught came in;
The front room fireplace
With coal-black stains...

                               
                            Excerpt, The Memory of Walls
                                                  © Jana Synková 

The original serving hatch at 'Blackbirds'

Here have taken
Centre stage
Our finest wares:
Never more heartily shared
Than at the table
Where bread is broken;
Friendship cemented;
Absent loved ones,
Lamented;
At which family heirlooms
And one's best china
Have rubbed shoulders
With humbler elements:
Serving spoons 
Which were a wedding present
And gilt-edged porcelain
From Bohemia,
Both, have blithely lain
Alongside napkins of faded linen
Included for nostalgia
And the last forks in the collection
Kept through fond recollection.
                  Excerpt from Dining Room Table, from The Memory of Walls  © Jana Synková 

​MID-CENTURY MODERN
         on a shoestring
& The Memory of Walls



​Jana Synek
Photography by Isabella Synek-Herd

​​Fascinated by the concept of nostalgia and personally invested in its importance, it is central to how I have refurbished Blackbirds and to my outlook on life; it is perhaps the most important message I wished to share in this book. For my fellow mid-centurians, this work, in its focus on the mid-century and its influence, is peppered with nostalgic triggers in photographic form: the love of mid-century themes, objects and décor is strongly reinforced for this generation, due to associations with childhood and because things like these were a very real part of their life journey. Thus a mid-century classic, the serving hatch is more than just a serving hatch: it is a symbol of home life for many who grew up in the 50s,  60s, and 70s; it is the memory of food being passed to children; it is a parent passing the plates through. That mid-century, retro and vintage are, by some lucky stroke fashionable again, is the icing on the cake for this generation. It is a door back to a lost childhood, or to parents who may no longer be present; for Citizen Kane, it is Rosebud.
       In Mid-Century Modern on a Shoestring, rather than priceless collectors’ pieces, I show how it is the simplest things which clutch at the heartstrings: some will be very personal to the individual: in my case, the musical jewellery box given to me by my father in which the ballerina still twirls when the box is opened; other objects will be familiar to the majority of those who grew up during that era: the Texas Instruments calculator many of us had at secondary school; the Puffin paperbacks with 70s cover illustrations; a game of Mastermind…                                                                              
       The exclamations of “I remember that!” or “I had one of those!” or again, “that takes me right back!” is something I hear time and again from those visiting my 1970s house or who see pictures of it: the warmth exuding from the expressions is priceless and affirming. Something as seemingly mundane as a magnetic soap holder can do it; a familiar book-cover can warm the cockles of the heart; an avocado bathroom is overwhelming. It is powerful stuff.
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​We had
So many frontiers
To cross,
And the sea
From England,
So far off;
But we came -
All squashed
Into the estate car,
Every gap filled,
And siblings’ elbows in ribs
And corners of packaging
Rubbing against legs;
And all the presents
We were bringing;
And the small blue suitcase
Into which I
Put my things.

Excerpt, The Memory of Walls, from the poem, Babiĉka, © Jana Synková 

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​​​From my rear window
The land rises
Into the hillside,
Wherein lies
A raised bed
Of shrubs and flowers
Level with my head,
Filled with peonies
And hortensia and old rose.
Here, I can observe freely
The garden birds,
Feet first
As they come and go...




Excerpt, The Memory of Walls,
from the poem, Birds in my Garden, 
© Jana Synková 

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​​​Bring down the box of memories
Filled with much loved things
From all our Christmas happenings:
Angels and baubles
And icicles to dangle
From outstretched branches;
Fairy lights in a tangle;
Decorations made at school
From glitter and loo roll -
These best of all.

Christmas is coming!
Chill winds are blowing
Snow is snowing.
The years, they are going…

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Excerpt, The Memory of Walls,
from the poem, Christmas is Coming, 
© Jana Synková 

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Pixie (15/09/07 - 31/03/21) beloved pet of @pipsapplesandpears, at Cam Peak, Gloucestershire.

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​​If love were a dog,
It would be a border collie,
Loyal to a fault and true.
It would come bounding
Fetching, tail-wagging, jolly,
Its beloved ever in view.

​If love were a dog,
It would be this black and white beast,
Who with a soulful eye,
Would know when to sit quietly
And share one’s grief,
And when not to probe or pry.


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Excerpt from  If Love Were a Dog, in memory of our childhood border collie, Ponto
​(The Memory of Walls) © Jana Synková 

Original illustration in pen and ink for front cover of 'The Memory of Walls', in the neo-romantic style, by Isabella Synková.

For the mid-centurians amongst us, nothing is more likely to fill us with nostalgia than the sight of the Puffin paperback in all its unassuming beauty, taking us straight back to our childhood and early teen years,
       The iconic, instantly recognizable covers from the 50s through to the 70s were collected, borrowed, devoured and treasured, and were, for so many, an inseparable part of childhood. 
       Here are just a few of those still gracing shelves, bookcases and tables here at Blackbirds :  the covers are at once stunningly illustrated and enormously evocative. 
       Which are your favourites? - or has this photograph inspired you to seek them out or start collecting all over again...? 

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​Left: A water colour painting by @grace_illuminates, inspired by Pauline Baynes' front-cover illustration for the Puffin paperback edition pf C. S. Lewis's 'The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe' , in 1959.  Pictured on the mossy, daisy-sprinkled lawn at Blackbirds.

​Above: Books are one of the most budget ways of adding interest to a room and can enhance its entire ambience. Here, the enthralling cover of the Puffin paperback Moonfleet, by John Faulkner,  conjures up tempestuous seas and shipwrecks by its very presence, but somehow makes one feel all the more cosily ensconced at home; the salty evokings lap at the very edge of the imagination, tempered by the comforting glow of the candle. 

Watch this space for more Puffin Book features!

Colmer's Hill, the Symondsbury Estate, Symondsbury near Bridport, Dorset

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​COLMER’S HILL
 
There stands
The lonely hill,
Seen from afar
By the traveller
On this stretch
Of the coast road.
A giant,
By no means,
Yet so it seems:
Head peeping up
Above its neighbours,
With distinctive
Flat-cap,
And top-knot
Of pine trees;
And outfits
Changing with
The seasons.
 
In Autumn
Its shoulders,
Cloaked in bracken,
Turn to amber;
While Winter’s
Scattering
Of snow
Tucks about its chin
A coat of ermine.
In Spring,
Bluebells of violet
Adorn
Its shapely form;
And Summer
Bestows
Upon its meadows
Verdant folds
Of velvet.
  

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​Perhaps, someday,
Instead of
Passing through,
I’ll climb
That lonely hill,
At Symondsbury
And see
The fabled view
A certain Viking
Took a liking to,
Adding his name
To local
Etymology.
 
Until then,
I can only imagine
The brilliance
Of shining sea
And the lush
Of green,
And scattering
Of farms,
And dots of sheep
And dips of valleys,
And ribbons
Of streams;
And the vista
Unspoilt still -
In many ways
Little changed
Since Viking days -
Of this corner
Of Dorset,
Old as the hills.


                                             Beyond the Pale,  Collection not yet released
                                                                          © Jana Synková   2021