Anne Rice and the Tree Foot

"Even the approach through the deserted streets seduced him. He walked slowly over cracked and uneven sidewalks of herringbone brick or gray flagstone, under an unbroken archway of oak branches, the light eternally dappled, the sky perpetually veiled in green." Anne Rice, The Witching Hour

I visited Anne Rice's former home yesterday, (well, the outside at least). I wanted to take pictures and to see in person the detailed descriptions of the Mayfair Witch's home in which I have been so absorbed for the past couple of days. The picture above is of Ms. Rice's home. It is now on the market for $3.7 million. I think I will put a bid on the house, what do you say?

While her former home is a gem, I was more interested to see the house that is across the street from where she wrote in her solarium (on the left side of the house, upstairs).

"Greek Revival style they called it - a long violet-gray town house on a dark shady corner in the Garden District, its front gate guarded it seemed by two enormous oaks. The iron lace railings were made in a rose pattern and much festooned with vines - purple wisteria, the yellow Virginia creeper, and bougainvillea of a dark, incandescent pink." Anne Rice, The Witching Hour

I believe that she took liberties in describing the Mayfair house and it is actually a combination of both her home and the house she could see from her window. Writers write what they know, after all. And her descriptions of this hauntingly beautiful city are, in my opinion, some of the most romantic, spot on descriptions around.

"Always he paused at the largest tree that had lifted the iron fence with its bulbous roots. He could not have gotten his arms around the trunk of it." Anne Rice, The Witching Hour

I thought this tree was interesting. One of the amazing, ancient oaks. It looks like the foot of a giant. And it is a giant! If these trees could talk, I wonder what they would say?

I think this one would say, "Oh my aching foot!"