Arthur Ransome - The Big Six - Roaring Donkey?

[grendel]

Does anyone know if the Roaring Donkey was a real Broads pub, and where it was?

Grendel

[Polly]

There were similarities to The Barton Angler but obviously it's in the wrong place for the narrative.

[MauriceMynah]

I always took it to be the Pleasure Boat Hickling.... or was that "Coot Club"?

[Guest]

In the various biographical books about Arthur Ransome, no matching real life Pubs have been suggested as the original Roaring Donkey, so it was probably one of his more abstract locations.

 

The description puts it approximately near Martham Ferry Dyke, but the line drawing doesn't match any Pub around there, even allowing for it being in the 1930's.

 

He used poetic license quite a bit really, with the Swallows & Amazons lake being a cocktail of Windermere and Coniston.

[LizG]

I always felt it was above Potter - imagining it to be somewhere on the edge of the marsh in the Martham area - but not a specific pub that we would know?