named bench · ix · cloister corner
A long oak slab on stone legs, set in the inside corner of the cloister where the south walk meets the east. There were, originally, four legs. One was broken in nineteen-something by a workman moving a ladder, and the leg was, in the manner of the place, never replaced. The slab rests on the wall behind for its missing support, leaning the bench back at four degrees from level. Whoever sits on it sits a little reclined, and reads a little louder.
The view is the inside of the cloister arch, the strip of garden in the inner court, the four-cornered light that the four walks share between them at noon. The fountain in the middle is dry in summer and full in winter, which is the opposite of what it was built for. From the bench the eye runs the length of the south walk and stops at the cross-vault before the chapel door.
It is sat on by whoever is reading aloud — an office that rotates without rota, by whoever brings a book in the right hour. The reclining does the rest. They think, mostly, that the missing leg is the better arrangement; with four legs the bench was upright and read down toward the page, and with three it reads up into the cloister. The wall is glad of the work. The silent writers keep their backs to it.
field-note the four-degree lean was measured by a guest who travelled with a small spirit level. he was not invited back. the lean has been four degrees for forty years.
cloister arch chapel silent writers three chapel porch bench