Hazlitt's, a boutique hotel in the heart of London that drips with literary history, is a favourite with writers, including JK Rowling. Just don't look under the bed, writes Fiona McCann
IN 1830 THE LANDLADY of a Georgian rooming house who was showing suites to potential lodgers failed to mention what has since become its selling point: the body of a dead writer under the bed.
To clarify, William Hazlitt's body is no longer under the bed, exactly, but his name is on the door and his literary predilections still permeate the tiny shabby-chic boutique hotel that was once his home.
Slap bang in the heart of Soho, Hazlitt's Hotel occupies three Georgian houses on Frith Street, its heavy doors and muted exterior like pursed lips politely disapproving of the 21st-century shenanigans that stagger past.
Despite being surrounded by the neon-lit mayhem that is London's entertainment Mecca, life inside Hazlitt's hallowed walls remains resolutely 18th century in style. Narrow corridors, dark- wooded antique furnishings and musty, leather-bound books stacked on window sills and against the dim electric lights that are among Hazlitt's few visible concessions to modernity make it clear where the hotel stands on matters such as minimalism.
Such is its refusal to engage with modern fripperies, in fact, that lifts are still conspicuously absent from Hazlitt's, the floors being reached by a novel, and somewhat old-style, amenity called a staircase.
Some concessions, admittedly, have been made, with televisions, air conditioning and Wi-Fi broadband access available throughout the building. But if enter your room a little squiffy, or with a little squint, you can easily blot out the modern accessories and see only an antique four-poster bed, a brass-fitted claw-footed bathtub and a 17th-century essayist's body under the bed.
Well, perhaps not the latter, but with rooms named after long-gone gentlefolk who once stayed at this modest address, among them Jonathan Swift, it's hard not to shiver a little at the presence of a past that emanates from the warped floors and seems to hang stubbornly around the heavy drapes while London zips by.
Cracking gilt-framed portraits on the walls and antique writing desks in every room complete the old-school illusion, and the provision of satisfyingly starchy stationery for late-night scribblers adds to the phantom presence of so many wordsmiths.
But Hazlitt's is not just a dead writers' haunt: it's also a favourite among present-day literati who wander over from meetings at Bloomsbury Publishing, around the corner, for drinks, interviews or, simply, a room of one's own.
A favourite with JK Rowling, who reportedly always takes the Lady Frances Hewitt suite, Hazlitt's has also been graced by Ted Hughes and Yann Martel, among others. It was mentioned by Bill Bryson in his book Notes from a Small Island, in which the US author confessed himself a particular fan of Hazlitt's because "it doesn't act like a hotel".
In this Bryson summed up the charm of this defiant hotel, which, besides not having a lift, also lacks a dining room. One takes breakfast in one's bedroom, like an 18th-century dowager. Yet it has a library full of first editions signed by writers who have stayed at Hazlitt's.
The beds are small, the rooms dark, the floors wonky and the bathrooms sometimes poky, but book lovers aren't known for lavishness, and what the hotel lacks in modern amenities is more than compensated for by the lively imaginations of its guests and the legacy of those who have composed, cavorted and even kicked the bucket within its welcoming walls.
Go stay
Because of restoration work being carried out on a number of the hotel's rooms, Hazlitt's (www.hazlittshotel.com) has been offering special rates since December. Thankfully, none of the effects of the work is visible anywhere other than your pocket. Double rooms start at £149 (€195). Superior doubles start at £159 (€210). Baron Willoughby's suite starts at £225 (€295).
Other London literary haunts
48 Doughty Street was once the home of the man often credited with putting London on the literary map: it is where Charles Dickens completed some of his best-known works, including Oliver Twist, Nicholas Nickleby and The Pickwick Papers. It now houses a museum in his honour (www.dickensmuseum.com).
221b Baker Street, a modest Victorian lodging next to Regent's Park, is where Sherlock Holmes solved many a mystery with the help of his delightful sidekick, Dr John Watson. These days it functions as - you've guessed it - a museum, dedicated to Arthur Conan Doyle's famous creation (www.sherlock-holmes.co.uk).
84 Charing Cross Road is the address from which Marks & Co, the bookshop lovingly remembered in Helene Hanff's 84 Charing Cross Road, once operated. Although this address no longer houses a bookshop, the street is still known for its specialist and second-hand bookshops. A brass plaque now marks the spot where Hanff's correspondent Frank Doel wrote his eloquent letters.
46 Gordon Square, in the heart of Bloomsbury, is where Virginia Woolf, then Virginia Stephen, spent some of her formative years and where members of the Bloomsbury Group gathered. It's also the address where Lytton Strachey broke taboos by dropping the word semen into conversation in - gasp! - mixed company.
Highgate Cemetery is perhaps best known for housing the bones of Karl Marx, but it is also the final resting place for some renowned literary figures, among them Middlemarch author George Eliot and poet Christina Rossetti (www.highgate-cemetery.org).
" Hazlitt's Hotel occupies three Georgian houses on Frith Street, its heavy doors and muted exterior like pursed
lips politely disapproving of the 21st-century shenanigans that stagger past