The Nature Reader

Anyone read any Llewelyn Powys?

Just coming to the end of Conrad's "The Mirror of the Sea" in the Little Toller Nature Classics Series - have found it a bit of a slog.

Not particularly enjoying Nan Shepherd's "The Living Mountain".

i could've sworn I'd posted something on Llewlyn Powys on this thread, but I haven't - mentioned him on one of the what are you reading threads here:

Llewelyn Powys - Earth Memories (essays on nature, his tuberculosis, and a superb essay on Pieter Breughel - 'There have appeared from time to time in all countries certain artists who have discounted that whole field of religious and metaphysical experience which to many sensitive natures would alone seem to render the rudeness of life tolerable')

I really like the Earth Essays in fact - lovely late summer evening reads. I liked his phrase, that i stumbled across elsewhere - 'to be out of the grave, the great exemption'. At that time it seemed like a pleasant corrective to a maundering nihilism, which I have a weakness for, hopefully more internal than expressed, but finding out since that he was tubercular and reading some of the essays, it has additional force.

haven't any time to post recently, but I read the rob macfarlane essay on the eerie in pastoral a few weeks ago. it was good to see so many things I like put in one place. i found myself quibbling with it a lot though. some of that was probably the quibbling where two people have opinions in an area they know well, hair splitting - the sort of thing you see in books pages, sympathetic in interests if not always in manner - but i keep feeling there was something a bit 'off' about it. made some notes as i went, but it was a while ago now and i was on a plane, but will try and reconstruct some of my responses here.

One of the descriptions of A View from a Hill is described as 'the pinnacle of pastoral,' which suggests pastoral is a single type of expression, but there have been too many different versions of pastoral for it to have a pinnacle I think. it stands alongside comedy, tragedy, satire, romance and latterly realism as a persistent form of expression in western art. what's important to distinguish are its variants, whether that's marvell or de la mare, ballard, betjeman or capability brown, æmilia lanyer or christina rosetti. i think more restricted genres only can have pinnacles of that sort - MR James would in fact be a pinnacle of ghost story writing for me. it may seem picky, but i think this 'singlenness' underpins RM's essay, and causes some missteps.

'Important to distinguish its variants' because pastoral is defined by both uchronia and utopia - we use it as an area of projection (past) and desire (future)- so it represents both passively and actively (in terms of our configuration of it - archtitecture, landscaping, national parks etc), hidden aspects of our psyche and society *at a given time*. It is particularly flavoured by national self-identity. Distinguishing the threads helps untangle some of what makes us who we are.

i have a gut aversion to psychogeography - which I rationalise (how successfully i'm not sure) as a feeling that it is something that is bad at continuous history, at linking its artefacts to the present. it flattens the world around us, it lacks perspective, it gothicises the now with its disjecta membra. i don't mind that as an æsthetic, i do mind it as a heuristic. it has the same singleness as 'pinnacle of pastoral'. I would be interested to tackle this a bit more with someone who is a fan, as I don't really want to chuck it out of court - there's a lot there that I feel I should like, just seems to me that it's been jumbled the wrong way.

I don't agree with his categories - 'eerie' is doing too much work to yoke MR James and pastoral, though I agree with his attempt to divide horror from it. My definitions would be something like horror - the evil is described and is visible, and ghost stories - a less tangible fear, the evil is hidden, only partially described, and in the dark. ‘Eerie’ suggests to me something unrealised but destablising, something that can prompt a psychological unravelling. MR James’s beings do generally make their way into the world, but not until after a series of frames or narrative seals have been removed. They come from within books or pictures, are disinterred, enlivened from cloth and wood at the touch or presence of evil or evil intent, unintentionally bidden into material being. Eerie is empty.

My prefered term would be 'malign' pastoral. There is something in the apparently edenic that wishes us harm and I *think*, though I'm not sure, that this is p much a continuation of portrayals of the marginalised and oppressed Celt, shorter and darker than the incoming Anglo-Saxons, or perhaps the earlier mysterious switch from prehistoric cthonic pastoral, to the sky and sun worshipping period. Puck, the Little Folk, fairies generally, Jack o' the Green, hobbits and hobgoblins too, lurk in uncertain cultural spaces between evil, mischief, merriment and disruption. This thing that wishes us harm is licentious and priapic, so particularly threatening to periods of constrained morality. so there's also an element of 'daphnis and chloe gone bad' or at least more sexualised than manners would previously allow in more coy depictions. Men are innocent and virginal, often seen as victims, woman are strongly desired and idealised, as well as being despised and reviled for being 'tempresses'. John Cowper Powys' Wolf Solent is a great portrait of this, but then of course so is The Wicker Man. (Penda's Fen remains the most remarkable analysis of post-war pastoral i know, where the innocence is that of a youth discovering his gay sexuality in a heavily manichean pastoral setting). (Just on that 'marginalised Celt' thing, I think one of the things that distinguishes US pastoral is that the marginalisation, partial destruction and displacement of its aboriginal natives is comparatively recent. It is a process that can testify against the present, and is available as an existing force rather than being purely symbolised by its remnants (folk or actual - eg stone circles).

In fact MR James is not even particularly pastoral. His method is usually retribution deliberately placed or designed into human artefacts - curtains, mazes, books, choir stalls, mezzotints etc - and little of his writing evokes pastoral elements (not even the bit Macfarlane quotes as the pinnacle of pastoral - it's more a sort of picture postcard pastoral (which, yes, *is* a form!). This is the form of category error that i think psychogeography makes, and RM makes in the essay - too much is indiscriminately aggregated into one place, linking by piling in a congeries of stuff ('eerie') in this case. Arthur Machen is a much better bet for his argument, tho slightly less canonical.

Some more fragmented thoughts in my notes:

I think this may be my problem but things like 'James is one of only two writers who has caused me to wake myself with my own screaming' have me going 'oh come *on*'. Frankly I don't believe him, but as I say, I think maybe this is a failure of imagination on my part. I remember first reading The Rings of Saturn by Sebald, where he gets lost in a maze and makes it seem mortally inextricable, and then has a diagram of the maze on the next stage and scrawling ru fuckin srs in the margin.

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RONG - Everyone knows Greenwich is the eeriest Cooper Dark is Rising text! Not the Dark is Rising itself. [and for several of the reasons already cited above - the way it violently wrenches the role of the woman in malign pastoral from male perspective into female, it's strong jack o'the green elements, and by far the strongest sense of unaligned primal force, rather than the moral good and bad.]

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‘We are very far from nature writing’. This is true. Tho see Walter de la Mare (very strong on nature writing), Jocelyn Brooke’s seasonal writing and Denton Welch, all with links to the uncanny and malign pastoral.

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Why is the civil war so important? Again, lack of detail leads to rongness, saying it’s appealing because it was a ‘radicalised period’ as current writers etc wish ours to be ignores the: Puritanism, land in common, non conformism nexus. Also, the beings that shift over time as a consequence of religious/cultural changes – Dymchurch Flit.

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His attempt to explain the appeal of 'military and security' (i'd add 'communication' to that) within all this is interesting. Though he got a wholehearted nod from me with 'The monumental era of 20th-century detection technology, when structures needed to be vast in order to see further, has proved especially attractive' I was less certain when he linked it with current fears about state surveillance. It's still something i'm struggling to get a sense of really, though there's no denying its force. My current theory would be something like 'fear of nuclear annihilation resulted in speculation about a society that would have to return to the very rudimentary possibly prehistoric pastoral. The structures that signified these powers (electrical, nuclear) in the landscape symbolised this fear or expectation. This has resulted in a specific 'science+pastoral' aesthetic':

Plutonium waste
Eking out in drowned steel rooms a half
Life of how many million years? Enough
To set the doomsday clock - its hands our own:
The same rose ruts, the red-as-thorn crosshatchings-
Minutes nearer midnight. On which stroke
Powers at the heart of the matter, powers
We shall have hacked through thorns to kiss awake,
Will open baleful, sweeping eyes, draw breath
And speak new formulae of megadeath.

Something of the Ozymandias about them maybe too, in this light. Something something space travel new pastoral old civilisations something. Anyway, interesting essay, always nice to see lots of good things mentioned in one place. Tho smdh Iain Sinclair.

I meant to respond to your post wisely, Fizzles.

I'm still *stuck* on Shepherd's "The Living Mountain". I'm determined to finish it but it feels like hard work, particularly as it is only 100 pages or so.

I bought Powys' "Earth Memories" and might appear on this thread to talk about it but judging from previous experience might just whinge about finding it a slog ..

I meant to respond to your post wisely, Fizzles.

i really do think in cases like this it's the thought that counts.

Anyone buying the Richard Skelton book?

What's been great this year?

Feel like I've given up on/put aside more books than usual this year.

Looking forward to Marcus Sedgwick's "Snow" and Cheryl Tipp's "Sea Sounds" monographs in 2016, though.

And Amy Liptrot's "The Outrun".

Oh ... from the Guardian:

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/dec/05/best-nature-books-2015?CMP=share_btn_tw

(Made me intrigued about "Fish Ladder" and "Inglorious").

"The Outrun" is very good. Beautifully observed. Loved the chapter about ambergris (a version of which appeared on Caught By The River).

Also, really enjoying Fred Kitchen's "Brother to the Ox". What I've read so far is pretty much "farming memoir" though I think that changes.

May be of interest: http://richardjefferiessociety.co.uk/

The Outrun is seriously amazing but I'm obviously personally biased on that regard. It's one of those books where I didn't have to sugar-coat my reaction at all, but I thin I embarrassed Amy a little by how much I responded to it haha. :-/

Less than a month into the year ... I nominated it for the above.

Tempting:

http://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/jan/26/landskipping-painters-ploughmen-and-places-review-anna-pavord-constable-hardy

Just noticed Amy Liptrot has written an intro for RM Lockley's Dream Island.

Really enjoyed Kitchen's "Brother to the Ox" - it was very much a "read a chapter each night before sleep" sort of book. It was very matter of fact about the hardship of farming life, in a way that really worked.

Finally reading Gilbert White's "The Natural History of Selborne". Very much along the lines of "I saw a rare bird. It was beautiful. And then I shot it and preserved it in brandy".

Was quite tempted after reading this:

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/feb/15/britains-got-talons-the-writer-raised-on-raptors

Less so, after reading this:

http://markavery.info/2016/03/06/book-review-raptor-james-macdonald-lockhart/?platform=hootsuite

(I must confess I quite enjoyed the latter review as - despite the "But is it nature writing?" beefs - I often imagine that reviews of such books are those of friends writing about each other's work.)

"Do you ever have the sense that you're being marketed to so strongly that you just want to cross your arms across your chest, narrow your chest, and say "hmmmmm"?"

Strangely, I've just read Robert Seethaler's "A Whole Life" - the best book I've read in a long while, not a "nature book" and one that I thought I'd found fairly randomly (it was a local bookseller's favourite book of last year). I liked enough that once I'd finished it I Googled it and what comes up? It was a Robert Macfarlane "recommended holiday read" in The Guardian.

Also, can I just say I've always been a big fan?

Amy Liptrot's column should definitely be a book ... particularly loved the one about whale vomit.

Actually, a few of the columns could happily morph into books.

― djh, Wednesday, 17 October 2012 19:45 (3 years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

*stuffs great bonxie in mouth to stop from saying the really exciting thing*

Your book?

Just say it.

Ha! No.

My "nature reading" has stalled a bit. What've I missed?

Just read 'The Running Hare: The secret life of farmland'
https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/1109213/the-running-hare/
It's mostly great but I had to break my own rule about never commenting on books on Amazon after reading the exclusively 5 star reviews of it. It goes on a bit (lists of lost flowers comes off more as some kind of litany and just made me drift off) but more mystifyingly it suddenly lays into Monbiot and rewilding. Now, I have issues with both those as well but this is a book ABOUT REWILDING A FIELD for God's sake...the guy virtually forces hares to live in his field, and about the evils of agrochemical farming, I mean aren't him and Monbiot essentailly on the same side? Also I found myself being irritated by the way he seemed more like a weekend farmer than anything - instead of a second home he had a second field. Having said all this it is beautifully written and contains something of interest on every page. It made me more determined than ever to get out in the English countryside more. Worth having for sure.

Anyone buying the Richard Skelton book?

Just ordered it. Loved Crossings.

Oh sod it - I mean Landings...!

Strangely, I love the "Landings" album but have never read the accompanying book (although I have it), for some reason.

Enjoyed "Beyond The Fell Wall" and have been reading his poetry retrospective, "The Pale Ladder". Both are the kind of books you need to read in small doses - savour words and re-read paragraphs - rather than settle down for a long session.

I can't think what but I'm sure I've read something that put me off the Lewis-Stempel book. (If it wouldn't lesson anyone's enjoyment of the book) Having just read your review on Amazon and a review in the Guardian, what's his issue with Monbiot and how does he explain having hunted foxes and having sabbed fox hunts?

I was about to say I've never been convinced by Skelton's prose (if that's what it is) but I wonder if it was just that I'd had my Skelton fill and stopped reading and listening around the same time. Glancing at Landings, I can still feel the latent power in it. It vibrates and resonates in the same way as his music.

Nice thing on Annie Dillard in the latest LARB: https://lareviewofbooks.org/article/thats-inspiration-rereading-annie-dillard/

I would say I'm far more moved by Skelton's recordings than his writing (though can find time for both).

Just pre-ordered RM Lockley's Dream Island in a moment of weakness (Had intended to read a pile of books before I bought anything else).

http://wainwrightprize.com/2016/06/30/the-wainwright-prize-2016-shortlist-revealed/

Common Ground, Rob Cowen (Windmill)

The Outrun, Amy Liptrot (Canongate)

Landmarks, Robert Macfarlane (Penguin)

The Moth Snowstorm, Michael McCarthy (John Murray)

The Fish Ladder, Katharine Norbury (Bloomsbury)

The Shepherd’s Life, James Rebanks (Penguin)

Now in its third year, the prize awards £5,000 annually to the work that best reflects renowned nature writer Alfred Wainwright’s core values of celebrating the great British outdoors.

This year’s shortlist draws a spotlight on the continued resurgence of nature and travel writing in the UK and the staggering breadth of personal issues explored through the genre.

Memoir features strongly, with Amy Liptrot’s experience of alcoholism and recovery explored through her wild Orkney homeland (The Outrun), Rob Cowen’s journey into parenthood set within his exploration of a square-mile of Yorkshire woodland (Common Ground), Katharine Norbury’s life spent walking Britain’s glittering rivers (The Fish Ladder), James Rebank’s account of life as a shepherd in the Lake District (A Shepherd’s Life), and Michael McCarthy’s moving memoir of childhood trauma that offers a rallying cry for protecting our environment (The Moth Snowstorm). Meanwhile, Robert Macfarlane rounds off the shortlist, earning his second shortlisting with his meditation on words and landscape (Landmarks).

http://www.commonground.org.uk/leaf/#

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/aug/05/wainwright-prize-goes-to-amy-liptrots-searingly-honest-the-outrun

Did anyone read Monbiot's "How Did We Get into This Mess? : Politics, Equality, Nature"?

Hasn't seemed as prominent as "Feral"

Ned Trifle - have you seen there's a newly published Claire Leighton, "Country Matters"?

Richard Jefferies Society writing prize 2016:

Nominations for the 2016 award are now closed. The winner will be selected in May and announced on 3 June 2017. The long list under consideration is:

•The Outrun by Amy Liptrot
•Landskipping by Anna Pavord
•The Running Hare by John Lewis-Stempel
•Wild Kingdom by Stephen Moss.
•A Sky Full of Birds by Matt Merritt
•Rivers Run by Kevin Parr
•The Art of Falconry by Patrick Morel
•The Tree Climber’s Guide by Jack Cooke
•Nightingales in November by Mike Dilger
•Walking Through Spring by Graham Hoyland
•Ladders to Heaven by Mike Shanahan
•Six Facets of Light by Ann Wroe
•Island Home by Tim Winton
•The Remedies by Katharine Towers
•How to Read Water by Tristan Gooley
•The Wood for the Trees by Richard Fortey

Leighton's "Country Matters" not really doing it for me (though I loved "Four Hedges").

Quite enjoyed Horatio Clare's "Orison for a Curlew", about his search to see a slender-billed curlew ... particularly as he notes on the first page that he doesn't see one and it is probably extinct.

I stall on Gilbert White's "The Natural History of Selborne" but have picked it up again - I hadn't realised until flicking back through this thread that I started it over a year ago.

Not strictly a "nature" book but a combination of writing about an allotment and a memoir about growing up in the foster system but Allan Jenkins' Plot 29 is well worth a read.

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/mar/31/plot-29-a-memoir-by-allan-jenkins-review

Not strictly a book at all, but a lovely documentary on BBC2 about Helen Macdonald getting and training a new goshawk: Natural World, 2017-2018: 7. H is for Hawk: A New Chapter: www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b09b68wy

It treads some of the same fine, slightly mawkish, lines as the book but that's OK.

Any "river" book recommendations? It will be for a present for someone who potters in a canoe.

Weirdly, I haven't read any of this year's Wainwright Book Prize shortlist.

The Last Wilderness by Neil Ansell (Tinder Press)

Hidden Nature by Alys Fowler (Hodder & Stoughton)

Outskirts by John Grindrod (Sceptre)

The Dun Cow Rib by John Lister-Kaye (Canongate)

The Lost Words by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris (Hamish Hamilton)

The Seabird’s Cry by Adam Nicolson (William Collins, HarperCollins)

The Salt Path by Raynor Winn (Michael Joseph)

This is probably a bit shameless, but I've been writing this on and off for a few years; I stopped writing for various reasons (work, purpose) but put something up today:

https://somesmallcorner.co.uk/

Any nature book recommendations for pre-school children?

According to their Twitter account, a distributor handling Little Toller's books has gone into administration, losing them fairly horrendous amounts of money.

I think they'd appreciate purchases from their website, right now:

https://www.littletoller.co.uk/shop/