By indulging in the experience of being alone, we can be inspired to find our own rewards and ultimately lead richer, fuller lives. Our fast-paced society does not approve of solitude; being alone is so often considered anti-social and some even find it sinister. Why is this so when autonomy, personal freedom and individualism are more highly prized than ever before? Sara Maitland answers this question in How to Be Alone by exploring changing attitudes throughout history. Offering experiments and strategies for overturning our fear of solitude, she helps us to practise it without anxiety and encourages us to see the benefits of spending time by ourselves. The School of Life looks at new ways of thinking about life’s biggest questions. Discover more fascinating books from the series with How to Stay Sane and How to Think More About Sex.

Fairytales are one of our earliest and most vital cultural forms, and forests one of our most ancient landscapes. Both evoke a similar sensation in us - we find them beautiful and magical, but also spooky, sometimes horrifying. In this fascinating book, Maitland argues that the two forms are intimately connected: the mysterious secrets and silences, gifts and perils of the forests were both the background and the source of the fairytales made famous by the Grimms and Hans Christian Andersen. Yet both forests and fairy stories are at risk and their loss deprives us of our cultural lifeblood. Maitland visits forests through the seasons, from the exquisite green of a beechwood in spring, to the muffled stillness of a snowy pine wood in winter. She camps with her son Adam, whose beautiful photographs are included in the book; she takes a barefoot walk through Epping Forest with Robert Macfarlane; she walks with a mushroom expert through an oak wood, and with a miner through the Forest of Dean. Maitland ends each chapter with a unique, imaginitive re-telling of a fairytale. Written with Maitland's wonderful clarity and conversational grace, Gossip from the Forest is a magical and unique blend of nature writing, history and imaginative fiction.

After a noisy upbringing as one of six children, and adulthood as a vocal feminist and mother, Sara Maitland began to crave silence. Over the past five years, she has spent periods of silence in the Sinai Desert and the Australian bush and on the Isle of Skye. She interweaves these experiences with the history of silence told through fairy tale and myth, Western and Eastern religious traditions, the Enlightenment and psychoanalysis, up to the ambivalence towards silence in contemporary society. Maitland has built a hermitage on an isolated Scottish moor, and the book culminates powerfully with her experiences of silence in this new home.

Most feminists have turned away from the Christian churches, regarding both Catholicism and the protestant denominations as bastions of sexism and patriarchal oppression. However, Christian feminists committed to improving the position of Christian women and to the spiritual renewal of their respective churches are drawing inspiration for their struggles from the contemporary Women's Movement. In this study Sara Maitland looks at what has been happening to Christian women in general, and Christian feminists in particular, over the last fifteen to twenty years. She sets their experiences in the framework of the history of the churches and reviews it in the light of events such as the Second Vatican Council, the ordination of Baptist and Episcopal women ministers in America and Britain, and the debate about the ordination of women in the Anglican communion. She argues that the insights gained by Christian feminists put them in a unique position to prophesy to their respective churches, leading them back to the Gospel imperatives of love, justice and freedom, and that an understanding and acceptance of this role of women is crucial to the well-being of the whole Church. As well as studying the history, theology and institutional structures of the denominational churches, the book uses a wealth of interview material from both sides of the Atlantic to describe the experiences of women from many different backgrounds, including nuns, women priests and lay workers. Sara Maitland concludes that Christianity can and must pass beyond the long centuries of oppression and division into 'a new country', a country in which women and men are equally 'made in the image of God'. First published in 1983.

A concise and practical book for experienced and novice writers.

Most feminists have turned away from the Christian churches, regarding both Catholicism and the protestant denominations as bastions of sexism and patriarchal oppression. However, Christian feminists committed to improving the position of Christian women and to the spiritual renewal of their respective churches are drawing inspiration for their struggles from the contemporary Women s Movement. In this study Sara Maitland looks at what has been happening to Christian women in general, and Christian feminists in particular, over the last fifteen to twenty years. She sets their experiences in the framework of the history of the churches and reviews it in the light of events such as the Second Vatican Council, the ordination of Baptist and Episcopal women ministers in America and Britain, and the debate about the ordination of women in the Anglican communion. She argues that the insights gained by Christian feminists put them in a unique position to prophesy to their respective churches, leading them back to the Gospel imperatives of love, justice and freedom, and that an understanding and acceptance of this role of women is crucial to the well-being of the whole Church. As well as studying the history, theology and institutional structures of the denominational churches, the book uses a wealth of interview material from both sides of the Atlantic to describe the experiences of women from many different backgrounds, including nuns, women priests and lay workers. Sara Maitland concludes that Christianity can and must pass beyond the long centuries of oppression and division into a new country, a country in which women and men are equally made in the image of God .

First published in 1983."

Performing a deft metaphorical evisceration of Sigmund Freud's classic 1919 essay that delved deeply into the tradition of horror writing, this freshly contemporary collection of literary interpretations reintroduces to the world Freud's compelling theory of "das unheimliche"--or, the uncanny. Specifically designed to challenge the creative boundaries of some of the most famed and respected horror writers working today--such as A. S. Byatt, Christopher Priest, Hanif Kureishi, Frank Cottrell Boyce, Matthew Holness, and the indomitable Ramsey Campbell--this anatomically precise experiment encapsulates what the uncanny represents in the 21st century. Masterfully narrated with the benefit of unique perspectives on what exactly it is that goes bump in the night, this chilling modern collective is not only an essential read for fans of horror but also an insightful and intriguing introduction to the greats of the genre at their gruesome best.

Although mostly concealed, our bedrock geology profoundly determines what we see around us - not just our landforms, but the built environment too, from Aberdeen, often called the "granite city" to Bath, constructed from honey-coloured limestone- rocks shape the world around us. In Cornerstones, some of Britain's leading landscape and nature writers consider their relationship with the ground beneath their feet. Distinguished by a strong sense of place and close observation, these essays take the reader out into the landscape and convey the tactile heft, grain and rub of the rock, showing how it shapes our familiar landscapes. Adapted from the successful BBC Radio Three series, Cornerstones explores how different rock types give rise to their own distinct flora and fauna, and even affect the food we eat.

A bryologist enters an ancient piece of British woodland to research a rare strain of moss, only to discover an even more exotic specimen; a geologist explains the failures of the feminist movement to her teenage niece in terms of tectonic subduction; two Old Testament newlyweds scheme to make the most of their tightly negotiated dowry by applying 21st-century genetic engineering techniques--each story in this collection of short fiction fuses together specific pieces of scientific research with an ancient myth or folkloric archetype. In these stories, readers will encounter witches that can outwit botanists, religious soothsayers that read evolutionary biology in feverish dreams, and scientists who fall in love with the birds that they study. A specially written afterword penned by a scientist follows each story, expanding upon the theory within the story, be it quantum mechanics, planetary physics, game theory, or nanotechnology.

For Sara Maitland, the Scriptures, tradition, and the creation are sources of God's greatest gift to us-the desire and the ability to know something about God. In A Joyful Theology, Maitland makes a lively exploration of creation in order to learn more about the Creator. What she finds is a God who inspires awe, who calls us to be committed to one another, and who invites us to live in joy.

Whatever happened to British protest? For a nation that brought the world Chartism, the Suffragettes, the Tolpuddle Martyrs, and so many other grassroots social movements, Britain rarely celebrates its long, great tradition of people power. In this timely and evocative collection, twenty authors have assembled to re-imagine key moments of British protest, from the Peasants' Revolt of 1381 to the anti-Iraq War demo of 2003. Written in close consultation with historians, sociologists and eyewitnesses - who also contribute afterwords - these stories follow fictional characters caught up in real-life struggles, offering a streetlevel perspective on the noble art of resistance. In the age of fake news and post-truth politics this book fights fiction with (well researched, historically accurate) fiction.