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Following our recent list of 9 Movies Where Buildings Play a Big Role, we at SkyriseCities are pleased to present our list of eight real-life locations from the world of classic literature. From Chaucer to Orwell, we will explore the real-world locations that inspired eight classic pieces of literature from the last 600 years.
1. The Tabard Inn, as featured in The Canterbury Tales (1386), by Geoffrey Chaucer
Before setting off "To Canterbury with ful devout corage," and "nyne and twenty in a compaignye," the main characters described in Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales gather at The Tabard Inn in Southwark, a borough in London, England, before beginning their pilgrimage. Captured in a wood-cut illustration from the mid-nineteenth century, The Tabard Inn was first established in 1307. It survived for another five centuries until its eventual demolition in 1873. The inn was originally built as a coaching inn with attached stables, before it fell victim to the arrival of the railway. Its connection to Chaucer was memorialized with a historic plaque in 2003, which was dedicated by none other than former Monty Python member Terry Jones.
2. Cawdor Castle, as featured in Macbeth (c. 1599-1606), by William Shakespeare
In perhaps one of the most memorable scenes from Shakespeare's Macbeth, the titular Macbeth meets the Weird Sisters upon the blasted heath near Holinshed following his victory against the traitor MacDonald. Here the witches deliver their prophecy to the future king, setting in motion the series of tragic events that frame the remainder of the play. Hailed as Thane of Cawdor, (and king hereafter), the witches connect Macbeth to Cawdor Castle, seen above, which would soon become attached to his ill-gotten new title. Construction began in 1454, though the present-day castle was built upon and expanded for a period of at least four centuries, before becoming a popular tourist destination and national historic site. Post-dating the real Macbeth by more than three hundred years, the literary link to the famous play has plagued the real-life Thanes of Cawdor ever since Macbeth's first performance at the Globe Theatre around 1600.
3. Notre-Dame Cathedral, as featured in The Hunchback of Notre-Dame (1833), by Victor Hugo
The epitome of French Gothic architecture, Notre-Dame de Paris, begun in 1163 and completed in 1345, takes centre stage as the setting of Victor Hugo's 1833 masterpiece, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. Written at the time of the Bourbon Restoration and two decades before the major reconstruction of central Paris during the reign of Napoleon III, the medieval cathedral is home to the eponymous Hunchback, the hero of Hugo's story, and friend to fellow outcast Esmerelda. Seen above, the cathedral's iconic gargoyles (allies to Quasimodo in the 1996 Disney adaptation), serve as stoic stone sentinels overlooking the city down below. Now a major tourist attraction that brings millions of visitors to its doorstep every year, Notre-Dame is one of France's best-known sites and is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
4. Bran Castle (Dracula's Castle), as featured in Dracula (1897), by Bram Stoker
Similar to the modern-day fate of Cawdor Castle, Bran Castle in Romania has been irretrievably linked to Bram Stoker's 1897 Gothic Horror masterpiece, and the castle's popularity grows with every subsequent adaptation to film, television, or otherwise. Situated along the historic border between the regions of Transylvania and Wallachia, the castle is the setting for both the introduction of Count Dracula to protagonist Jonathan Harker and to the action-packed showdown and final act. The one-time home of Vlad III Dracula, known after his death in 1477 as Vlad the Impaler, the first Bran Castle was built of wood in 1212 by Teutonic Knights and the stone structure we see today dates from 1377. Linked by Stoker in the novel to the Prince of Wallachia, the titular Count Dracula is described as belonging to a long line of Transylvanian royalty, most certainly linked to Vlad the Impaler. Today Bran Castle remains one of the most popular tourist destinations in Eastern Europe.
5. Chicago Stockyards, as featured in The Jungle (1906), by Upton Sinclair
Chicago's once infamous Stockyards and Meatpacking District were the gritty urban setting for Upton Sinclair's famous muckraking 1906 novel and home to The Jungle's tragedy-prone Lithuanian immigrant family, headed by the story's main protagonist Jurgis Rudkis. The startling novel created a public uproar upon publication and ultimately led to the creation of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) under direct orders from President Theodore Roosevelt. This iconic work of the Progressive Era has had a lasting impact within the realms of health and safety and urban planning in the century since publication. In continuous operation from the end of the Civil War in 1865 to July 30, 1971, the 106-year history of the Chicago Stockyards defined the Windy City for more than a century.
6. New York, Long Island, and "The Valley of Ashes," as featured in The Great Gatsby (1925), by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Written at the height of the Roaring Twenties during a time of unprecedented wealth and upward mobility in the Unites States, in an era which witnessed the birth of Jazz, flappers, rum-runners, and bootleggers, F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby offers a wonderful window into the heart of this exciting time period. Set in 1920s New York, Gatsby is said to live in West Egg, across the bay from East Egg, both being stand-ins for the wealthy enclaves that once existed on Long Island. Beyond the adventures at Gatsby's mansion, the characters make regular excursions to Manhattan, visiting Fifth Avenue, Washington Heights, and the Plaza Hotel. Of all the locations explored, however, none stands out quite as vividly as what the narrator describes as The Valley of Ashes, "a fantastic farm where ashes grow like wheat into ridges and hills [...] where ashes take the form of [...] men who move dimly and already crumbling through the powdery air." Located in what was once the Corona Ash Dump in Queens, the present day site of the Valley of Ashes is now known as Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, a large former industrial site which went on to host both the 1939 and 1964 New York World's Fairs after extensive clean-up efforts in the 1930s.
7. Old Toronto Star Building (The Daily Planet), as featured in Action Comics No. 23 (April, 1940), by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster
Though perhaps not quite within the bounds of what most would consider "Classic Literature," a significant portion of the inspiration behind Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster's vision for Superman — whose alter ego, the mild-mannered Clark Kent, spends his days working as a reporter for The Daily Planet — came from the Canadian-born Shuster, who spent his early years as a newsboy for what was then known as the Toronto Daily Star. Built in 1929, by the Toronto architectural firm of Chapman and Oxley, the Art Deco Toronto Star Building that stood at 80 King Street West became immortalized in comic book form in the April 1940 issue of Action Comics No. 23, which features Superman battling Titano, a King Kong-esque giant gorilla with death-ray vision, who has scaled the tower intent on mayhem. Demolished in 1972 to make way for First Canadian Place, remnants of the facade remain on display within the grounds of the Guild Inn in Scarborough.
8. Senate House, University of London (The Ministry of Truth), as featured in Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949), by George Orwell
"Big Brother is watching you," goes the mantra of George Orwell's dystopian vision of the future in Nineteen Eighty-Four, in which society exists under constant surveillance, their every action and thought monitored by an anonymous central intelligence agency known as the Ministry of Love, Peace, Plenty, and Truth. Navigating the dangerous waters of pervasive propaganda, historical revisionism, and thoughtcrime, the protagonists of Oceania, a post-apocalyptic Britain, must live according to society's rules or face dire consequences. Of all the settings in the novel, the dubiously named Ministry of Truth, in which the two main characters are employed, was directly inspired by the University of London's 1937-built Senate House, a relatively stark Art Deco structure that would have stood out against its Georgian and Victorian Era surroundings upon completion. The building also provided inspiration for writer Graham Greene and his 1943 anti-Fascist novel, Ministry of Fear, which was later adapted to film by director Fritz Lang, of Metropolis (1927) fame, in 1944. The Senate House has enjoyed its fair share of notoriety, and now serves as home both to the Vice-Chancellor of the University of London and to the deep resources of the University Library.
Have a suggestion for any further literary connections to architecture? Did your favourite book not make the list? Let us know in the comments section below!
