The Gate of the
Giant Scissors
by Jane Marion
September 2003
Many years ago, my mother
introduced me to The Little Colonel books, and ever since, I have loved
them. For the last 18 years, I have been living in France, and one of the
first things I did after moving to Paris was to try to find the "Gate of the
Giant Scissors".
My search started in 1986, after
looking up all the little references in The Gate of the Giant Scissors and
The Land of the Little Colonel about the old place. Armed with this
information, I drove south to Tours, and headed over the bridge to the "old
walled village of St Symphorien", which still closely resembles Joyce Ware's
descriptions. I came upon a lovely old house, now a hotel, called the Castel
Fleuri, and asked if, by chance, anyone had ever heard of the fictional
characters, but, after all these years, no one had the slightest idea ....
Again, following the clues in the books, I headed up the hill, and simply
drove around until I happened upon what so strongly resembled the gate-posts
in the 1898 edition of the Cozy Corner edition of The Gate of the Giant
Scissors, that I was convinced that "this must be it"!
Rather than ringing at the gate
without any notice, I decided to return to Paris, and write directly to
whomever lived at that address. Imagine my surprise, when I received a very
kind letter from the owner, telling me that, indeed, her home bore the name
Les Grands Ciseaux (which means "the giant scissors"), and inviting me to
call.
Without hesitation, I telephoned to
my mother in Boston, and she arrived in September of 1986 to travel back
with me to St Symphorien. Our excitement knew no bounds when a charming
Frenchwoman answered our ring at the gate. Passing through the gate, we saw
the property and her home, built in 1929, which had replaced the house as
described in the book. Madame had never heard of the Little Colonel or the
Wares, but was genuinely interested and amused by the story. She then showed
us the wrought iron decoration which had bridged the space above the two
gate posts. My mother and I were ecstatic! For it showed, amongst the
wrought iron curlicues of the period, a large center medallion embellished
with a pair of scissors. On either side of the medallion is a squirrel, but
no one seemed to know why.
After having coffee with Madame, we
left in the knowledge that we had truly traveled in the footsteps of one of
our favorite characters, Joyce Ware.
*****************
(Webmaster's note: The ironwork
that made the Gate unique was no longer in it's original place as of
September 1986, but was being stored in an outbuilding on the Ciseaux
estate. Since Mrs. Marion made the trip to Tours and Saint-Symphorien
(Indre-et-Loire), we do not know what became of the ironwork. We'd
like to think that it may have been returned to it's original location.
Any updates from our website visitors would be most sincerely appreciated!
By the way, the original gate was in the
Rue Ronsard near Rue Frédéric Chopin and the cemetery. Most of the
Ciseaux estate has since been subdivided, but the gate itself, we are told,
is not difficult to identify. At the time of the story, this area was
a good distance in the country beyond Saint-Symphorien's walls.
Artists drawings of the gate from the original books
(click pictures for enlargements)
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