But there is only one blue plaque. Displayed on the wall of number 16 it remembers the artist William Turner, who lived and worked here from 1833 until his death in 1862. Close by The Oxford Sausage headquarters, it is not uncommon to witness tour guides introducing the place as the home of JMW Turner, arguably England’s most famous Romantic painter. But this is a different Turner altogether.
Today I am venturing a short distance out of town to a place known as Pleasant Land. I don’t as yet know why it is called this. I am just thinking what a wonderful name with its promise of green pastures and natural beauty, both of which are in evidence as I make the steep climb away from the busy city up to Boars Hill, an area of countryside between Oxford and Abingdon.
‘The Silent Traveller in Oxford’ by Chiang Yee is inscribed in a flowing red script along the spine of a cream linen bound volume, with its Chinese calligraphic equivalent written vertically from top to bottom on the front cover. Open its pages and there are exquisite watercolours, deliciously comic cartoons and beautifully written poems and travelogues describing Yee’s perambulations around the city in the early 1940’s. A snip, I thought, at £14. When I return home, I discover that Yee was something of a celebrity.
Bring out the mustard, dish up the mayonnaise, keep ketchup at the ready. For today I am both astonished and delighted to be celebrating the second anniversary of The Oxford Sausage. Publishing a weekly Oxford Sausage story for two years makes for over one hundred of the things. Several strings I’d say and enough I’d hope to make the party go with a bang. You are all invited.