From Slightly Foxed. Charmian Clift writes about the house she lived in with George Johnston on the Greek island of Hydra.
Last year I watched a programme during the Hay Festival that featured Polly Samson in a décor of Kostakis's café where Charmian and George spent their drinking hours.

There were some empty pages at the end of this book and I would have liked them to be filled with more island observations; I wanted it to go on and on until the years when Marianne arrived, and Leonard Cohen. But no, these are the early years, settling in to Greek life, having to deal with non-existent plumbing, barely existent water even, managing with little money, waiting for the royalties to come in... the memories are tinged with gold but all is certainly not rosy.
Clift is a wonderful writer; she noted down her experiences daily so it is something like an island blog but with masterful descriptions of the places and especially the people. I wonder what it was like, living 24/24 with her husband who soon became ill with TB and impotent from the drugs and insanely jealous (but this is not in the book). I'm glad their three sunbacked children had a happy island life.
Thanks to Charmian I finally understand why Greeks like to eat their stodgy pasta dishes cold. Not because, as I was told, it was better to eat cold in hot weather, but because the kitchens didn't have ovens - everything was taken to the baker's oven, and by the time it reached home again (home sometimes being up hundreds of steps), it had cooled down.

I'm now thinking about whether I want to read George Johnston's books written during this island sojourn.