The English Lakes: A History

With more than twenty million visitors each year, England's Lake District―its dramatic landscape long the inspiration of poets and painters―continues to fascinate and attract people from across Britain and abroad. Author Ian Thompson, who grew up nearby and hiked the region's hills from an early age, proves the perfect guide to the Lake District's storied past.Thompson's elegant cultural history details how the perception of the region changed, from one of "horrid mountains" to "vales of peace," due in large part to the work of Romantic poets William Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, and Robert Southey―later christened the "Lake Poets." The region's reputation was furthered by the landscape paintings of J.M. W. Turner, the writings of John Ruskin, and the illustrated stories of Beatrix Potter. All were drawn to the area's unique charms, and helped make it the treasured place it is today.Full of fascinating detail and dozens of full-color illustrations―including Thompson's own photographs― The English Lakes is sheer delight for armchair travelers, history-lovers, and Anglophiles.