Talk:Jones' Hill Wood

Did this wood really inspire Roald Dahl to write Fantastic Mr. Fox?
I'm doing a bit of digging, as it seems this may not be the woods that inspired Roald Dahl after all, or at least, it wasn't only Jones Hill Wood.

Fantastic Mr. Fox was inspired by the area around Gipsy House, where Roald Dahl lived (source), however, Jones' Hill Wood is nowhere near here. It seems much more likely that the woodland that inspired the story to be written was Angling Spring Wood, situated right beside Gipsy House. Indeed this is backed up by the Chilterns AONB website. I don't believe Jones Hill Wood has any connection to Fantastic Mr. Fox, and that this is a mistake that has snowballed due to the current HS2 protests and emotion surrounding the loss of woodland. In fact I can't find anything pre-2010 which links Jones Hill Wood to Roald Dahl.

Please share your thoughts, I believe the two articles cited here are mistaken and I propose the removal of the sentence about Roald Dahl and Fantastic Mr. Fox. NemesisAT (talk) 21:18, 8 April 2021 (UTC)
 * I have gone ahead and boldly removed that sentence, while also creating a new article at Angling Spring Wood.NemesisAT (talk) 21:37, 8 April 2021 (UTC)


 * You right to point out the sources are garbled but I'm not quite sure about where you went from there. Already in the article are sources saying:
 * "Nearly half of the wood said to have inspired Roald Dahl to write Fantastic Mr Fox will be destroyed for HS2 this autumn. The author was known to be a regular visitor to Jones Hill Wood, near Aylesbury Vale, Buckinghamshire" - Woodland Trust
 * "Dahl wrote his stories in the Buckinghamshire town of Great Missenden, and classics like Fantastic Mr Fox are said to have taken inspiration from the wood" - BBC
 * "The wood was the inspiration for Roald Dahl's children story Fantastic Mr Fox." - BBC
 * And the blog you linked says: "Another of Roald Dahl’s children’s books which was greatly influenced by the landscape in the Chiltern Hills is Fantastic Mr Fox". So I'll reinsert the claim and take out the bad ref that maybe threw you off. Mujinga (talk) 09:12, 9 April 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for this. What I was trying to say was I think people have linked Jones Hill Wood to Roald Dahl in an effort to boost the anti-HS2 campaign. The tree at the end of the orchard mentioned here is almost certainly the one at Angling Spring Wood, according to the Chilterns AONB website it blew down in 2003. The BBC are generally trustworthy but I've seen them make mistakes before especially on local issues like this. I appreciate though this may be original research on my part so I won't edit this any more. I still think however that the connection between Roald Dahl and Jones Hill Wood is much weaker than suggested by the Woodland Trust and activists, if it's there at all. Best wishes NemesisAT (talk) 11:01, 9 April 2021 (UTC)

There are a number of sources that directly say angling spreing wood inspred fantastic mr fox see here: 1)https://www.independent.co.uk/travel/uk/bfg-film-stephen-spielberg-release-date-roald-dahl-great-missenden-home-a7148221.html 2)https://www.chilternsaonb.org/ccbmaps/450/137/angling-spring-wood.html In a number of the sources that link jones hill wood to the book it only says it is said to be the inspiration further down the article even if it says it was the inspiration in the title, see these two: 1)https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/hs2-jones-hill-wood-roald-dahl-b1838069.html 2)https://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/press-centre/2020/08/hs2-destroys-roald-dahl-wood/ I will update the article to say it is said to of inspired Roald Dahl and other sources say angling spring wood was the inspiration.Ncnub (talk) 13:37, 23 December 2021 (UTC)