News — Ely

A review for To the Eel Island by Charles Moseley in the TLS. On one level this is about relocating in later life to a new home that is more manageable 

Far more than a mere memoir of moving house, the book becomes a philosophical inquiry into rootedness, change, and the persistence of the past in the fabric of the present.

Charles Moseley writes about his move from a fenland village to the nearby historic little city of Ely and breathes life into the history, natural world and people who have made his new home what it is today.

On one level, a story about moving, in old age, from a village to a nearby town, in this case the city of Ely. But also a moving exploration of ‘belonging’ and of moving on, of the layers of past generations of the local people who have shaped the new place, and the changes over the years wrought by nature and the shifting Fenland landscape.

To The Eel Island by Charles Moseley.

On one level, a story about moving, in old age, from a village to a nearby town, in this case the city of Ely. But also a moving exploration of ‘belonging’ and of moving on, of the layers of past generations of the local people who have shaped the new place, and the changes over the years wrought by nature and the shifting Fenland landscape.

2023 marks 1350 years since St Etheldreda first established a monastery in Ely in AD 673. Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims have flocked to Ely Cathedral in her name and churches across the country have been named in her honour. By any standards, Etheldreda was a remarkable woman in a time of remarkable women. Far from being the wishy washy figure of so much stained glass, she was – had to be – a tough operator. Great saints are not pushovers. She got her way. She changed the map in the Not-Yet-England of her time (c. 636 AD-679 AD). What was...