Members of The Friends of Tilling descended on Rye last weekend for their annual Tilling Gathering. This year was special however. The light-hearted group which brings together lovers of Mapp and Lucia from the novels by Rye author EF Benson, was celebrating its twentieth anniversary.
The Friends of Tilling was formed in November 2004 by friends Jonathan Dunlop and Darren Reynolds, and the group meets up annually in Rye at the Mermaid Inn for a day of Mapp and Lucia themed events. Writer, biographer and broadcaster Gyles Brandreth is president of the group, and novelist Sir Alexander McCall Smith is vice president.
Author EF Benson (son of former archbishop of Canterbury – Edward White Benson) lived at Lamb House in Rye for over twenty years until his death in 1940. He wrote six novels over a period of 19 years, Queen Lucia, Lucia in London, Miss Mapp, Mapp and Lucia, Lucia’s Progress, and Trouble for Lucia – commonly known as the Lucia novels. Four of them are set in the town of Tilling, which is effectively Rye, Lamb House becoming Mallards, home to first Miss Mapp and then Lucia. In the 1980s Mapp and Lucia was dramatised for television by Granada Television, and also a further version in 2014 Mapp and Lucia was made and broadcast on television by the BBC.
The Friends of Tilling’s special day included a walk to Benson’s grave at Rye Cemetery. Thankfully the rain held off. This was followed by the town crier of Rye, Paul Goring welcoming the Friends to Rye in his own inimitable style, outside the Mermaid Inn. Then a ploughman’s lunch, which included a reading, this year an excerpt from Mapp and Lucia, where Lucia visits Mallards with a view to renting it, this read by Richard Crowest. The lunch was attended by the mayor and mayoress of Rye, and the mayor, Councillor Andy Stuart and Susan Sexton a great-great niece of Archbishop Benson (EF Benson’s father), cut a special twentieth anniversary cake.
The day ended with a dinner in the evening, at which members are encouraged to wear period costumes or dress as one of the characters from the books. After the meal there was a much fought over quiz – all questions were on all six of the novels, following a tie-break question involving three teams, a team called ‘Georgie’s Embroidery Circle’, were crowned winners for 2024. Detail of the group can be found at www.friendsoftilling.com.
Image Credits: Jonathan Dunlop .