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WINNER OF THE GUARDIAN FIRST BOOK AWARD Once we thought monsters
lived there. In the Enlightenment we scaled them to commune with
the sublime. Soon, we were racing to conquer their summits in the
name of national pride. In this ground-breaking, classic work,
Robert Macfarlane takes us up into the mountains: to experience
their shattering beauty, the fear and risk of adventure, and to
explore the strange impulses that have for centuries lead us to the
world's highest places.
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The Lost Words: Spell Songs (Hardcover)
Robert Macfarlane, Jackie Morris, Karine Polwart, Julie Fowlis, Seckou Keita, …
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R633
R534
Discovery Miles 5 340
Save R99 (16%)
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Ships in 9 - 15 working days
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Spell Songs is a musical companion piece to The Lost Words: A Spell
Book by author Robert Macfarlane and artist Jackie Morris. This
mixed media CD is accompanied by sumptuous illustrations from
Jackie Morris, new 'spells' by Robert Macfarlane, enlightening
thoughts by Robert, Jackie and Spell Singer Karine Polwart and
stunning photography by Elly Lucas. In 2018 Folk by the Oak
Festival commissioned Spell Songs because of their love of The Lost
Words book. Spell Songs comprises eight remarkable musicians whose
music engages deeply with landscape and nature; musicians who are
perfectly placed to respond to the creatures, art and language of
The Lost Words. They spent a week in Herefordshire bringing this
music together in the company of Jackie Morris. Art inspired music
and music inspired art. Jackie Morris immersed herself in the
musical residency where she generously created new iconesque
artwork of each musician and their instruments portrayed in an
unexpected and enchanting way. These stunning new artworks
accompany the CD. Spell Songs allowed these acclaimed and diverse
musicians to weave together elements of British folk music,
Senegalese folk traditions, and experimental and classical music to
create an inspiring new body of work. Here are 14 songs which
capture the essence of The Lost Words book. Spoken voice, whispers,
accents, dialects, native languages, proverbs, sayings, birdsong,
river chatter and insect hum all increase the intimacy of the
musical world conjured by the songs. Inspired by the words, art and
ethos of The Lost Words book, each musician brings new imaginings,
embellishments and diversions which are rooted in personal
experience, a deep respect for the natural world, protest at the
loss of nature and its language and an appreciation for wildness
and beauty. In February 2019 Spell Songs enjoyed standing ovations
at sell-out performances in major venues across the UK culminating
at The Queen Elizabeth Hall at the Southbank Centre, London. Spell
Songs was a highlight of The Hay International Literary Festival
2019 and in August 2019 they were invited to perform at the BBC's
Lost Words Prom in the Royal Albert Hall. They will continue to
tour each year. "There are songs here that would live with me for
the rest of my years, even if I'd had no part in their making".
Robert Macfarlane
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Trees - From Root to Leaf (Hardcover)
Paul Smith; Foreword by Robert Macfarlane; Text written by Yvette Harvey-Brown
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R1,320
R1,019
Discovery Miles 10 190
Save R301 (23%)
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Ships in 5 - 10 working days
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A landmark publication that captures the beautiful richness of
every aspect of trees and their importance for science, culture and
the future of humankind. Trees feed us, shelter us, inspire us and
heal us. In a world facing the destruction of the Amazon rainforest
and a pressing climate emergency, the importance of these primeval
beings in shaping our future is hard to understate. Generously
illustrated and organized according to tree lifecycle - from seeds,
leaves and form to wood, flowers and fruit - this book celebrates
the great diversity and beauty of the 60,000 tree species that
inhabit our planet. Exquisite details are rendered by surprising
photography and infographics: intricate bark and leaf patterns,
intertwined ecosystems, colourful flower displays, archaic wooden
wheels and timber houses. Integral to science, art and culture,
fundamental and fragile, dependent and depended on, the vitality of
trees is revealed like never before.
Are there any genuinely wild places left in Britain and Ireland? Or
have we tarmacked, farmed and built ourselves out of wildness? In
his vital, bewitching, inspiring classic, Robert Macfarlane sets
out in search of the wildness that remains.
Reissue of J. A. Baker's extraordinary classic of British nature
writing, with an exclusive new afterword by Robert Macfarlane. J.
A. Baker's extraordinary classic of British nature writing was
first published in 1967. Greeted with acclaim, it went on to win
the Duff Cooper Prize, the pre-eminent literary prize of the time.
Luminaries such as Ted Hughes, Barry Lopez and Andrew Motion have
cited it as one of the most important books in twentieth-century
nature writing. Despite the association of peregrines with the
wild, outer reaches of the British Isles, The Peregrine is set on
the flat marshes of the Essex coast, where J. A. Baker spent long
winters looking and writing about the visitors from the uplands -
peregrines that spend the winter hunting the huge flocks of pigeons
and waders that share the desolate landscape with them. This new
edition of the timeless classic, published to celebrate the 50th
anniversary of its first publication, features an afterword by one
of the book's greatest admirers, Robert Macfarlane.
Beautiful books make unforgettable Christmas gifts. This
pocket-sized treasure is the perfect gift for fans of nature,
language and rich artwork, adult and child alike! Kindred in spirit
to The Lost Words but fresh in its form, The Lost Spells introduces
a beautiful new set of natural spell-poems and artwork by beloved
creative duo Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris. Each "spell"
conjures an animal, bird, tree or flower -- from Barn Owl to Red
Fox, Grey Seal to Silver Birch, Jay to Jackdaw -- with which we
share our lives and landscapes. Moving, joyful and funny, The Lost
Spells above all celebrates a sense of wonder, bearing witness to
nature's power to amaze, console and bring joy. Written to be read
aloud, painted in brushstrokes that call to the forest, field,
riverbank and also to the heart, The Lost Spells summons back what
is often lost from sight and care, teaching the names of everyday
species, and inspiring its readers to attention, love and care.
'Luminously beautiful. An amulet in dark times, to be carried like
a talisman out into the world, where it is very much needed' Dara
McAnulty 'A book about spells that succeeds in being spell-binding
in its own right . . . It already feels like a true classic. Buy
one copy for yourself and any others for as many children as you
can afford' Books for Keeps
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Archipelago Anthology (Paperback)
Alice Oswald, Kathleen Jamie, Robert Macfarlane, Sinead Morrisey, Andrew McNeillie, …
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R728
R667
Discovery Miles 6 670
Save R61 (8%)
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Ships in 9 - 15 working days
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Archipelago is one of the most important and influential literary
magazines of the last twenty years. Running to twelve editions, it
was edited by scholar-poet Andrew McNeillie, with the assistance
later of James McDonald Lockhart, and began as an attempt to
reimagine the relationships between the islands of Ireland and
Britain. Archipelago has brought together established and emerging
artists in creative conversations that have transformed the study
of islands, coasts and waterways. It journeys from the Shetlands to
Cornwall, from the Aran Islands to the coast of Yorkshire, tracing
the cultures of diverse zones through some of the best in
contemporary writing about place and people. This collection
gathers poetry, prose and visual art in clusters grouped around the
Irish and British archipelago, with contributions from an array of
significant artists. With fifty contributors, Archipelago: A Reader
includes: Moya Cannon is an Irish poet with seven published
collections, the most recent being Collected Poems (2021). Deirdre
Ni Chonghaile is a graduate of the University of Oxford and
University College Cork. She is associated with NUI, Galway, and
the University of Notre Dame, and is known for her work in music
studies. Tim Dee is a naturalist, BBC radio producer and author of
The Running Sky (2018). Seamus Heaney (1939-2013) was born in
Northern Ireland. His career included teaching at Harvard and
Oxford. He received many awards including the Nobel Prize in
Literature, 1995. Kathleen Jamie is a Scottish writer whose work
has appeared internationally. She has taught poetry at the
University of Stirling since 2010. Michael Longley is a Northern
Irish poet, and winner of the Whitbread Poetry Prize, the
Hawthornden Prize, and the PEN Pinter Prize in 2017. Robert
Macfarlane is a Writing Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge. He
has won the EM Forster Award for Literature. Derek Mahon
(1941-2020) was a Northern Irish poet. He won the David Cohen Prize
for Literature and the Poetry Now Award. Andrew McNeillie is a
Welsh poet and current Literature Editor at Oxford University
Press. His memoir An Aran Keening was published by The Lilliput
Press, and he is founder of the Clutag Press and publisher of the
Archipelago series. Sinead Morrisey is a Northern Irish winner of
the T.S. Eliot Prize and the Forward Poetry Prize. She has taught
in Belfast and Newcastle. 'Archipelago met and extended my own
strong sense that there was a need to turn the compass-rose of some
storytelling and art in Britain and Ireland away from the south and
east and towards the north and west; away from the metropolis and
towards the margins.' -Robert Macfarlane
THE TIMES AUDIOBOOK OF THE YEAR 'The finest book ever written on
nature and landscape in Britain' Guardian In this masterpiece of
nature writing, beautifully narrated by Oscar-winning actor Tilda
Swinton, Nan Shepherd describes her journeys into the Cairngorm
mountains of Scotland. There she encounters a world that can be
breathtakingly beautiful at times and shockingly harsh at others.
Her intense, poetic prose explores and records the rocks, rivers,
creatures and hidden aspects of this remarkable landscape. Shepherd
spent a lifetime in search of the 'essential nature' of the
Cairngorms; her quest led her to write this classic meditation on
the magnificence of mountains, and on our imaginative relationship
with the wild world around us. Composed during the Second World
War, the manuscript of The Living Mountain lay untouched for more
than thirty years before it was finally published.
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Holloway (Paperback, Main)
Dan Richards, Robert Macfarlane; Illustrated by Stanley Donwood
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R300
R251
Discovery Miles 2 510
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Ships in 12 - 17 working days
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Holloway - a hollow way, a sunken path. A route that centuries of
foot-fall, hoof-hit, wheel-roll and rain-run have harrowed deep
down into bedrock. In July 2005, Robert Macfarlane and Roger Deakin
- author of Wildwood - travelled to explore the holloways of South
Dorset's sandstone. They found their way into a landscape of
shadows, spectres & great strangeness. Six years later, after
Roger Deakin's early death, Robert Macfarlane returned to the
holloway with the artist Stanley Donwood and writer Dan Richards.
The book is about those journeys and that landscape. Moving in the
spaces between social history, psychogeography and travel writing,
Holloway is a beautiful and haunted work of art.
In Underland, Robert Macfarlane delivers an epic exploration of the
Earth's underworlds as they exist in myth, literature, memory, and
the land itself. Traveling through the dizzying expanse of geologic
time-from prehistoric art in Norwegian sea caves, to the blue
depths of the Greenland ice cap, to a deep-sunk "hiding place"
where nuclear waste will be stored for 100,000 years to
come-Underland takes us on an extraordinary journey into our
relationship with darkness, burial, and what lies beneath the
surface of both place and mind. Global in its geography and written
with great lyricism, Underland speaks powerfully to our present
moment. At once ancient and urgent, this is a book that will change
the way you see the world.
A beautiful new edition of a classic work of landscape history, in
which Alfred Watkins introduced the idea of ancient 'ley lines'
criss-crossing the English countryside. First published in 1925,
The Old Straight Track described the author's theory of 'ley
lines', pre-Roman pathways consisting of aligned stone circles and
prehistoric mounds, used by our Neolithic ancestors. Watkins's
ideas have intrigued and inspired generations of readers - from
historians to hill walkers, and from amateur archaeologists to
new-age occultists. This edition of The Old Straight Track, with a
substantial introduction by Robert Macfarlane, will appeal to all
who treasure the history, contours and mystery of Britain's ancient
landscapes.
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The Lost Spells (Hardcover)
Robert Macfarlane, Jackie Morris
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R670
R532
Discovery Miles 5 320
Save R138 (21%)
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Ships in 10 - 15 working days
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The follow-up to the internationally bestselling sensation The Lost
Words, The Lost Spells is a beautiful collection of poems and
illustrations that evokes the magic of the everyday natural world.
Since its publication in 2017, The Lost Words has enchanted readers
with its poetry and illustrations of the natural world. Now, The
Lost Spells, a book kindred in spirit and tone, continues to
re-wild the lives of children and adults. The Lost Spells evokes
the wonder of everyday nature, conjuring up red foxes, birch trees,
jackdaws, and more in poems and illustrations that flow between the
pages and into readers' minds. Robert Macfarlane's spell-poems and
Jackie Morris's watercolour illustrations are musical and magical:
these are summoning spells, words of recollection, charms of
protection. To read The Lost Spells is to see anew the natural
world within our grasp and to be reminded of what happens when we
allow it to slip away.
THE SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER SHORTLISTED FOR THE SAMUEL JOHNSON
PRIZE The original bestseller from the beloved author of UNDERLAND,
LANDMARKS and THE LOST WORDS - Robert Macfarlane travels Britain's
ancient paths and discovers the secrets of our beautiful,
underappreciated landscape 'The Old Ways confirms Macfarlane's
reputation as one of the most eloquent and observant of
contemporary writers about nature' Scotland on Sunday Following the
tracks, holloways, drove-roads and sea paths that form part of a
vast ancient network of routes criss-crossing the British Isles and
beyond, Robert Macfarlane discovers a lost world - a landscape of
the feet and the mind, of pilgrimage and ritual, of stories and
ghosts; above all of the places and journeys which inspire and
inhabit our imaginations. 'Sublime... It sets the imagination
tingling, laying an irresistible trail for readers to follow'
Sunday Times 'Read this and it will be impossible to take an
unremarkable walk again' Metro 'He has a rare physical intelligence
and affords total immersion in place, elements and the passage of
time: wonderful' Antony Gormley
This sumptuous and comprehensive evaluation showcases Smith's 1815
hand-coloured map, A Delineation of the Strata of England and
Wales, with part of Scotland, and illustrates the story of his
career, from apprentice to fossil collector and from his 1799
geological map of Bath and table of strata to his detailed
stratigraphical county maps. The introduction places Smith's work
in the context of earlier, concurrent and subsequent ideas
regarding the structure and natural processes of the earth. The
book is then organized into four geographical sections, each
beginning with four sheets from the 1815 strata map, accompanied by
related geological cross sections and county maps (1819-24), and is
followed by displays of Sowerby's fossil illustrations (1816-19)
organized by strata. Interleaved between the sections are essays by
leading academics that explore the aims of Smith's work, its
application in the fields of mining, agriculture, cartography,
fossil collecting and hydrology, and its influence on
biostratigraphical theories and the science of geology. Concluding
the volume are reflections on Smith's later work as an itinerant
geologist and surveyor, plagiarism by his rival - President of the
Geological Society, George Bellas Greenough - receipt of the first
Wollaston Medal in 1831 in recognition of his achievements, and the
influence of his geological mapping and biostratigraphical theories
on the sciences, culminating in the establishment of the modern
geological timescale.
From J. G. Ballard, author of 'Crash' and 'Cocaine Nights' comes
his extraordinary vision of an African forest that turns all in its
path to crystal. Through a 'leaking' of time, the West African
jungle starts to crystallize. Trees metamorphose into enormous
jewels. Crocodiles encased in second glittering skins lurch down
the river. Pythons with huge blind gemstone eyes rear in heraldic
poses. Most flee the area in terror, afraid to face a catastrophe
they cannot understand. But some, dazzled and strangely entranced,
remain to drift through this dreamworld forest: a doctor in pursuit
of his ex-mistress, an enigmatic Jesuit wielding a crystal cross
and a tribe of lepers searching for Paradise. In this tour de force
of the imagination, Ballard transports the reader into one of his
most unforgettable landscapes. This edition is part of a new
commemorative series of Ballard's works, featuring introductions
from a number of his admirers (including James Lever, Ali Smith,
Hari Kunzru and Martin Amis) and brand-new cover designs.
From the bestselling author of UNDERLAND, THE OLD WAYS and THE LOST
WORDS - an essay on the joy of reading, for anyone who has ever
loved a book Every book is a kind of gift to its reader, and the
act of giving books is charged with a special emotional resonance.
It is a meeting of three minds (the giver, the author, the
recipient), an exchange of intellectual and psychological currency,
that leaves each participant enriched. Here Robert Macfarlane
recounts the story of a book he was given as a young man, and how
he managed eventually to return the favour, though never repay the
debt. From one of the most lyrical writers of our time comes a
perfectly formed gem, a lyrical celebration of the transcendent
power and humanity of the given book.
A beautiful gift for the intrepid explorer in your life by one of
the most acclaimed and beloved nature writers working today, the
internationally bestselling, prize-winning author of Landmarks, The
Lost Words and The Old Ways A SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER WINNER OF THE
WAINWRIGHT PRIZE 2019 WINNER OF THE STANFORD DOLMAN TRAVEL BOOK OF
THE YEAR AWARD 2020 'You'd be crazy not to read this book' The
Sunday Times A Guardian Best Book of the 21st Century In Underland,
Robert Macfarlane takes us on a journey into the worlds beneath our
feet. From the ice-blue depths of Greenland's glaciers, to the
underground networks by which trees communicate, from Bronze Age
burial chambers to the rock art of remote Arctic sea-caves, this is
a deep-time voyage into the planet's past and future. Global in its
geography, gripping in its voice and haunting in its implications,
Underland is a work of huge range and power, and a remarkable new
chapter in Macfarlane's long-term exploration of landscape and the
human heart. SHORTLISTED FOR THE RSL ONDAATJE PRIZE 2020
'Macfarlane has invented a new kind of book, really a new genre
entirely' The Irish Times 'He is the great nature writer, and
nature poet, of this generation' Wall Street Journal 'Macfarlane
has shown how utterly beautiful a brilliantly written travel book
can still be' Observer on The Old Ways 'Irradiated by a profound
sense of wonder... Few books give such a sense of enchantment; it
is a book to give to many, and to return to repeatedly' Independent
on Landmarks 'It sets the imagination tingling...like reading a
prose Odyssey sprinkled with imagist poems' The Sunday Times on The
Old Ways
Winner of 'Best New Writer' - British Sports Publishing Awards.
Winner of the 'Bill Rollinson Prize for Landscape and Tradition' -
Lakeland Book Awards Shortlisted for the William Hill Sports Book
of the Year Award and for the Boardman-Tasker Prize. An inspiring
insight into one of the oldest extreme sports, and a lyrical
tribute to Britain's mountains and the men and women who live among
them, this is the definitive story of fell-running. With an
introduction from bestselling author Robert Macfarlane, this is a
complete portrait of one of the few sports to have remained utterly
true to its roots - in which the point is not fame or fortune but
to run the ancient, wild landscape, and to be a hero, if at all,
within one's own valley. Richard Askwith's journey takes him into a
world of forbidding rockscapes, horizontal rain, fear, exhaustion
and stunning natural beauty, as well as his own attempt at one of
the purest and toughest challenges imaginable: the Bob Graham
Round, the sport's traditional test of 42 Lake District peaks in 24
hours. Along the way, he encounters some of the most prodigious -
and unsung - athletes Britain has produced, such as Joss Naylor,
who covered the equivalent of four Everests in a single run.
Gripping, funny and moving, this is a story that any aspiring
runner, endurance athlete or mountain-lover will understand well:
of extremity, heroism and the experience of a lifetime.
‘My favourite book about the wilderness’ Cheryl Strayed, author
of Wild In this shimmering masterpiece of American nature writing,
Edward Abbey ventures alone into the canyonlands of Moab, Utah, to
work as a seasonal ranger for the United States National Park
Service. Living out of a trailer, Abbey captures in rapt, poetic
prose the landscape of the desert; a world of terracotta earth,
empty skies, arching rock formations, cliffrose, juniper, pinyon
pine and sand sage. His summers become spirit quests, taking him in
search of wild horses and Ancient Puebloan petroglyphs, up
mountains and across tribal lands, and down the Glen Canyon by
river. He experiences both sides of his new home; its incredible
beauty and its promise of liberation, but also its isolating, cruel
side, at one point discovering a dead tourist at an isolated area
of the Grand Canyon. In his own irascible style, Abbey uses his
time in the desert to meditate on the tension between nature and
civilisation, and outlines a personal philosophy that would come to
heavily influence the environmentalist movement. Now published in a
special edition to celebrate its 50th Anniversary, this classic
seems remarkably prescient, and has lost none of its power.
A Poetry Book Society Special Commendation Autumn 2022. [To] The
Last [Be] Human collects four extraordinary poetry books-Sea
Change, PLACE, fast, and Runaway-by Pulitzer Prize winner Jorie
Graham. From the introduction by Robert Macfarlane: The earliest of
the poems in this tetralogy were written at 373 parts per million
of atmospheric CO2, and the most recent at 414 parts per million;
that is to say, in the old calendar, 2002 and 2020 respectively.
The body of work gathered here stands as an extraordinary lyric
record of those eighteen calamitous years: a glittering, teeming
Anthropocene journal, rife with hope and raw with loss, lush and
sparse, hard to parse and hugely powerful to experience. Graham's
poems are turned to face our planet's deep-time future, and their
shadows are cast by the long light of the will-have-been. But they
are made of more durable materials than granite and concrete, and
their tasks are of record as well as warning: to preserve what it
has felt like to be a human in these accelerated years when "the
future / takes shape / too quickly", when we are entering "a time /
beyond belief". They know, these poems, and what they tell is
precise to their form... Sometimes they are made of ragged,
hurting, hurtling, and body-fleeing language; other times they
celebrate the sheer, shocking, heart-stopping gift of the given
world, seeing light, tree, sea, skin, and star as a "whirling robe
humming with firstness". To read these four twenty-first-century
books together in a single volume is to experience vastly complex
patterns forming and reforming in mind, eye, and ear. These poems
sing within themselves, between one another, and across
collections, and the song that joins them all is uttered simply in
the first lines of the last poem of the last book: The earth said
remember me. The earth said don't let go, said it one day when I
was accidentally listening
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In The Cairngorms (Paperback)
Nan Shepherd; Introduction by Robert Macfarlane
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R320
R264
Discovery Miles 2 640
Save R56 (18%)
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Ships in 9 - 15 working days
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