Book description
The Collins Nature Library is a new series of classic British nature
writing - reissues of long-lost seminal works. The titles have been
chosen by one of Britain's best known and highly acclaimed nature
writers, Robert Macfarlane, who has also written new introductions that
put these classics into a modern context.
Nature Near London is a collection of observational pieces from
locations near London at the end of the 19th Century. The depth of
knowledge and of familiarity with particular places and particular
species gives the impression that each small piece is the product of
many years of observation.
His style of observation is a work in miniature - cataloguing the most
minute details; the dancing of a flower in the wind or the darting of a
cautious trout. The chapters centre on a special place, a certain
species, geographical feature or habitat - everything from orchards and
copses to rivers and streams.
Jefferies always explains the typical behaviour of whatever he is
describing, and often contrasts what he sees with what one would expect
to see in another part of the country, or in a different season. His
knowledge of flowers is wide-ranging, and his ability to describe one
particular patch of a field in such a specific way brings tremendous
variety to the chapters that make up the book.
The final chapters are a departure - both from the character of the
rest of the book, and from London itself, as Jefferies boards the train
to Brighton. Suddenly he is describing people and their relationship to
nature, as much as nature itself. The scope widens, less a work in
miniature, more surging towards a triumphant end as Jefferies becomes
ever more philosophical.
100 years on, the book becomes even more relevant than when it was
published - as a reminder of the dangers of unrelenting urbanisation,
but also the context of the trend that aims to recreate nature where we
need it most - around our cities. Nature near London is a portrait of
what we've lost, and a reminder of nature's positive and calming
influence. Going along with Jefferies is like taking an afternoon stroll
out of the city, without having to leave your armchair. Richard
Jefferies was an English nature writer. Born in 1848 in Coate, near
Swindon, he left school at 15, and began a career in journalism. After
being struck down with tuberculosis, Jefferies turned to longer form
writing, producing much fiction, the nature writing for which he became
most well known, and an autobiography. Jefferies died at his home in
Worthing in 1887.
Robert Macfarlane won the Guardian First Book Award, the Somerset
Maugham Award, and The Sunday Times Young Writer of the Year Award for
his first book, Mountains of the Mind (2003). His second, The Wild
Places (2007), was similarly celebrated, winning three prizes and being
shortlisted for six more. Both books were adapted for television by the
BBC. He is a Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge.
