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Jane Austen visited and lived in Bath. Visit Jane Austen Centre for events and exhibitions

The Holburne Museum of Art in Bath

The poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge lived in Somerset. Vist Coleridge Cottage in Quantocks

Watchet Harbour was the inspiration for the port in Coleridge's Rime of the Ancient Mariner

The Arnolfini Art Centre in a converted tea warehouse in Bristol for contemporary arts

The Arnolfini's cafe bar is a great meeting place

Banksy has left his mark all over Bristol - see if you can spot them!

The Harbourside and Watershed in Bristol are great for cafes, restaurants, cinema

Art and Literature Somerset Jane Austen Samuel Taylor Coleridge Lorna Doone Exmoor

For contemporary arts Bristol is the country's leading light with a huge range of art galleries and art centres and plenty of media friendly venues. However, Somerset has long been an inspirational place for all forms of art. The written word seems to have been particularly inspired by the Somerset landscapes and society. Samuel Taylor Coleridge drew much inspiration during the time he lived in the Quantock Hills in west Somerset writing some of his best work at Coleridge Cottage in Nether Stowey including Kubla Khan, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Christabel.

Jane Austen often visited and also lived in Bath for a short time. When she visited Bath Society was at its peak. There seems little doubt that watching the social etiquette of the time may well have inspired her character and she certainly used location in Bath and its surroundings in her novels. On Exmoor the Lorna Doone story is one of those that blurs the boundaries of reality and fiction. There are clear references to places on Exmoor and the Doones lived here at one time but RD Blackmore took some poetic licence with the story that has never been out of print since the second edition!

Jane Austen Bath North East Somerset

The Jane Austen Centre on Gay Street in Bath is a hugely popular attraction that caters for the never-ending fascination people have with Jane Austen, her life and works. Jane Austen visited Bath and lived there between 1801 to 1806. She first visited Bath in 1799 at the age of 21 with her mother, not long after she finished writing Northanger Abbey under its former title "Susan". Both her novels Northanger Abbey and Persuasion use Bath and areas around Somerset as a backdrop. Bath's season and the etiquette with which the gentry conducted themselves was typical of that often humorously examined in Austen's novels and it is highly likely that Jane Austen found much inspiration from her stays in Bath.

The Jane Austen Centre is housed in one of the Georgian terraced townhouses on Gay Street leading up to The Circus. Jane Austen lived at 25 Gay Street during 1805. Its displays, including period costumes, and information take you through Jane Austen's life and work and the importance of Bath within it. The Centre is very active in all things to do with Austen and has organised a variety of exhibitions such as one displaying several costumes that were designed by Andrea Galer for ITV's adaptation of Persuasion.

The Jane Austen Centre also organises guided walks, "Walking Tours of Jane Austen's Bath" that take you to places where Jane Austen lived, walked, visited and shopped as well as places that were featured in Northanger Abbey and Persuasion. Check our Bath Sightseeing Tours page for more information.

The Jane Austen Centre also has a shop selling books, cards, stationery, lace and needlepoint with specially designed gifts. You can relax in the Regency Tea Rooms upstairs that serves tea, cakes and light snacks. The Centre is open every day during the summer from 9.45am-5.30pm. Check their website for other current opening times. The Jane Austen Centre, 40 Gay Street, Bath BA1 2NT. Tel: 01225 443000. Email: info@janeausten.co.uk.

Jane Austen Festival Bath Somerset

In September an annual Jane Austen Festival is held in Bath that includes Europe's largest Regency Promenade - where participants stroll around Bath dolled up in period dress - The Jane Austen Festival Regency Ball and dance workshop in The Assembly Rooms - where you can learn how to take part in the dances of the period - as well as a host of activities relating to film, music, lectures, walking tours and outdoor entertainment.

Check the Festival website for up-to-date information on the latest Festival, link right.

Blaise Castle Bristol - Jane Austen Northanger Abbey

North West of Bristol city centre in Henbury is Blaise Castle.

Blaise Castle was built in the eighteenth century and is featured in Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey as the "finest place in England" by the heroine Catherine Morland - although the character never actually made it to the castle itself!

Blaise Castle Museum is located in the mansion house and holds some of Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery's paintings as well as displays on social history with period costumes, Victorian toys and model trains. The castle in the grounds is something of a folly built in 1786 in a triangle formation giving views from its hilltop position above the Avon Gorge. However, it was lived in until the twentieth century.

Blaise Castle House Museum, Henbury Road, Henbury, Bristol, BS10 7QS. Tel: 0117 903 9818. Email: general.museum@bristol.gov.uk.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge - Rime of the Ancient Mariner

Wordsworth claimed that Coleridge was inspired to write The Rime of the Ancient Mariner on a walk through the Quantocks with his sister and Wordsworth in the spring of 1798. Other claims are that he was inspired while visiting Watchet itself or that Watchet Harbour is the port from which the Ancient Mariner set sail. Either way there is a strong connection between Coleridge, Watchet and the Quantock Hills in Somerset. In 2003 a sculpture of the Ancient Mariner with the albatross hung around his neck was unveiled beside Watchet Harbour as a tribute to the poet.

Coleridge lived in Nether Stowey (about 10 miles east of Watchet) on the western side of the Quantocks for some time. The National Trust now own the cottage he lived in and run it as a small museum displaying some of his personal mementoes. It was here that the Rime of the Ancient Mariner was written. Coleridge Cottage, 35 Lime Street, Nether Stowey, Bridgwater, Somerset TA5 1NQ. Telephone: 01278 732662. Email: coleridgecottage@nationaltrust.org.uk

You can also pick up The Coleridge Trail from the cottage. This is a 36 mile long distance walking trail across the Quantock and Brendon Hills, Exmoor and ending in Porlock. Check the weblinks right for more information.

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is one of Coleridge's longest poems and mixes the supernatural with the trials of deep sea voyage. Along with Coleridge's other poems published in "Lyrical Ballads" in 1798 it is regarded the beginnings of British Romantic literature and a shift to modern poetry. It is a fantastic poem on epic proportions and is loved the world over. Unusual homages paid include Iron Maiden's song of the same name!

Lorna Doone Exmoor

The romantic story of Lorna Doone has become blurred between fiction and fact. The story was written by R D Blackmore and first published in 1869 and has never been out of print since 1870. The Doone's were known to live on Exmoor during the seventeenth century but are believed to have returned to Scotland.

The whole story is set in Exmoor in the 17th century during the Monmouth Rebellion and tells the story of the Ridd and Doone families whose feud started when the Doone clan, renowned Exmoor outlaws, killed John Ridd, a farmer. The Doone Family lived in Doone Valley and the difficulties arise when the John Ridd falls in love with Lorna who turns out to the grand-daughter of Sir Ensor Doone!

The parish church at Oare to the west of Porlock is where Lorna Doone is said to have been shot by her half-brother while she stood at the altar about to marry John Ridd. There is a memorial to RD Blackmore and a note showing which was likely to be the window through which she was shot.

Art Galleries Bristol Contemporary Arts Banksy

Bristol is renowned for being a centre for contemporary and media arts. This is certainly echoed in the attractions of the city - many of which are linked to the arts in one way or another. For art buffs you'll be in heaven with contemporary arts centres like the Arnolfini and Spike Island Artspace or for immersing yourself in the arts social centre head off to the Watershed for films and food. More traditional art exhibitions can be seen at the Bristol Museum and Art Gallery or the Royal West of England Academy of Arts in Clifton.

Bristol prides itself in having spawned a variety of contemporary artists in a variety of media. These range from social commentator graffiti artist Banksy to the more cuddly animations from Aardman Animations who have been based in Bristol since the 1970s. The wealth of talent and ability to attract works from all over the world is evident in the many art galleries in the city.

The graffiti artist, Banksy, hails from Bristol and caused heated debate as to weather his graffiti, often accompanied with amusing satirical messages, was art or vandalism. Thankfully Bristolians and the city council support all forms of art and many of his works have been kept around Bristol with only the odd mishap where it has been removed or painted over by accident. Many of his pictures are painted using stencils although no-one really knows how he does it or his identity.

Bath Art Galleries Holburne Museum of Art Victoria Art Gallery East Asian Art

Bath is home to several art galleries including the Holburne Museum of Art, the Victoria Art Gallery and the Museum of East Asian Art.

These are all based on private collections that were left to the galleries and include fine art, old masters, silverware, English Delftware, Chinese jade. Collections are constantly being updated or contemporary works are often included in the changing exhibitions hosted at the museums and galleries.

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