Tartarus Press: Copsford

Copsford by Walter J.C. Murray, Tartarus Press, 2019

One hundred years ago a young man, Walter Murray, spent a year in a derelict cottage, Copsford, working in lonely Sussex countryside among the wild animals and birds, with only a dog, Floss, for companionship. From the beginning, Murray has to fight not only the rats that infest his inhospitable house, and the elements outside, but also a loneliness that he finds soul-shatteringly oppressive.

Walter J.C. Murray

But Murray comes to delight in his simple life, despite its deprivations. Above all, he appreciates the wildlife he experiences in meadow and woodland, the animals and insects, birds and butterflies. And he comes to a deeper understanding of plants and trees, the sun, wind, rain, frost and snow. He wrote about his experiences in Copsford (George Allen and Unwin Ltd, 1948).

Copsford is an under-appreciated classic of the English countryside, delighting not only in flora and fauna, but in scent, colour, sound and movement. In beautiful and sensitive prose Murray expresses a vivid depth of feeling for nature that makes Copsford a tour de force of nature mysticism.

I first came across the book through my father, who was interested in it because Murray was a well-known figure in Horam, the village where he and I grew up. The author and literary researcher Mark Valentine then reminded me of the book a few years later. I discovered that my father had known the derelict house, Copsford, and that I had ranged across the same fields as a child (although the houe had been demolished by then). I have since revisited the site with my family and we were able to trace the outline of its walls in the rough ground.

Copsford by Walter J.C. Murray

Tartarus decided to reprint Copsford (which is now down to its last few copies), and it received some great reviews, being featured in the Sussex Express and on Wormwoodiana. Patrick Galbraith in Country Life wrote

‘The writing is masterful, moving gracefully between farce when he’s waging war on rodents and the sublime when he’s painting the beauty of the South Downs.’

As the book was being prepared for the printers, I composed a number of pieces of music inspired by the various elements of Murray’s book. These were released digitally on Bandcamp in 2020 and the album was recommended by Bob Fischer in his 'Haunted Generation' column in The Fortean Times. The track ‘Midsummer’has been played a few times on The Freak Zone, BBC Radio 6, by Stuart Maconie.

Copsford, 12" album, available at Bandcamp

The album is now available (while stocks last), in a very limited lathe-cut vinyl edition from the incomparable Bladud Flies! In this process each copy of the record is cut in real-time. Michael Lawrence, aka The Bricoleur, has mastered and cut the record, while Lauren Winton has created a wonderful centre etching, and has overseen the design of all the artwork for the sleeve and insert. There are only forty two numbered copies.