‘Let the wild world’s whispers call you in.’
Lost and found
I generally do not like to follow the crowd and simply post on here yet another rave review for a book that is already lauded widely all over the internet. However, when two of our most treasured advocates for the natural world produce yet another stunning volume what can I do but add my voice to the thousands already praising their incantations of ‘lost’ wonder?
Following the breathtaking impact of The Lost Words, this wordsmith-astist duo have now produced more of the same in The Lost Spells. And whilst ‘more of the same’ can sometimes be a rather derogatory description, it is categorically not so in this case When the original is unspeakably wonderful, and the follow-up every bit as special, how can ‘more of the same’ be anything but gloriously welcome.
Spellbinding words
Here again are Robert Macfarlane’s skilfully crafted orchestrations of words, sounds, rhymes and rhythms that delight eye , ear, and mind. At the same time they take us right into the spirit, into the soul of the very creatures and plants that are his subjects - and often into our own souls too, showing just how connected we really are. He truly helps us to see; see things that have always been there, but that we never knew, had forgotten, or never really appreciated; indeed, things we had lost. In bringing alive particular wonders of the British countryside, he brings the whole alive, and makes us alive to it, alive to life itself. His spells conjure little things, little things that are big things, simple things that are the very depth of everything.
Spellbinding images
When illustrations are successful, we often speaks of them as enhancing the text. Here it is almost the reverse, as Robert Macfarlane’s words complement page after of Jackie Morris’s breathtakingly beautiful art. Her images of animals and plants manage somehow to be free and flowing yet still to give the impression of sharp detail. Her colours are vivid, yet simultaneously subtle. What she sets before us are, very obviously, painted images, artifice, yet they are more ‘real’ than photographs, capturing not only the look but the spirit of a thing. Fixed as they are they so often create the most magical feeling of movement, the swirl, the prowl, the sweep of things; the float of a feather through air, the slap of a grey seal’s tail against water, the silent beating of a pale moth’s wings. I want to say the height of perfection in her art is to be seen in the simple shape of a white egret against a vast double page of sky. That is, until I come across the downward swoop of an owl, the drama of starlings against a red brick wall, or find myself stopped in mid breath by the mesmerising eyes of a fox.
The more you look, the more you read, the more images and words dance together, echo each other, say the same things, tell the same truths, and help us rediscover the lost.
Then larger, now smaller . . .
Yet, there is one way in which the new books could not be more different from its predecessor, in its format. The Lost Words is a huge and opulent volume. It drips gold, as a background to many of the images, and strews it across the lettered pages. It is huge and radiant in its impact as well as its size. It is stunning, almost iridescent.
The Lost Spells is, by contrast, a much smaller book, thicker but less ostentation than its older sibling. But, in its way, it is equally captivating. Rather than make you want to stand back, this book invites you in. Its greater number of pages allows for fuller exploration of each subject. If the earlier book is a portable gallery, this follow-up has more of the feel of a pocket field guide, although I would no more cram such a beautiful object into a pocket that I would take it into a muddy field. But its message, its songs, its spells will for ever go with me, out into field or woods, when I walk, when I conjure up awareness.
The Lost Words and The Lost Spells are much the same, but very different. Very special in their sameness, and very special in their difference.
One minor drawback of the new smaller, thicker volume, is that some of Jackie Morris’s double spread images get slightly distorted by the depth of the fold. The curved bill of the curlew is a particular casualty. But this is nowhere near enough to detract from another triumph: another not-to-be-missed, gem of a book. We should be enormously grateful to its creators for what they have once again given to our children, and to all of us; for what they have done for us as human beings, and for what they are doing for our lives - and for our world.
Let their whispers call you in.
Let the seal and the moth call you in. Let the oak and the daisy call you in. Let the owl and the fox call you in.
