2026-09-18
17 分钟Hello and welcome to Meet the Writers.
I'm Georgina Godwin.
There are few things quite as simple as opening a book.
And yet, in that small gesture, an entire world can unfold.
A story can take us somewhere we've never been, into another life, another time, another way of seeing.
And that seems a good place to begin here at Chatsworth in Derbyshire,
one of Britain's great country houses and home to the Cavendish family for more than five centuries.
Its library holds more than 40,000 books, collected across generations.
And for the first time, they're the subject of an exhibition of their own, House of Stories.
I'm inside the house with Fran Baker, Chatsworth's librarian and archivist.
This section kind of focuses on past librarians.
So we have the world-famous philosopher Thomas Hobbes in the 17th century, John Payne Collier,
who was a forger, had a notable second career, unknown to the Duke.
In the 19th century, Eugenie Strong was one of the earliest female country house librarians.
So we've got quite an interesting story around the librarians
as well as the family who collected books over the centuries.
Some of the books here are familiar landmarks.
Others still contain mysteries.
One is a handwritten collection of 17th century poetry.
We're continuing the theme of the library with some very early library catalogues,