“How to See Nature” by Paul Evans

“How to see nature” (2018) by Paul Evans is a beautiful book both literally in terms of its thick cardstock pages as well as in its sophisticated prose. His writing of his observations of nature in the United Kingdom weaves in historical and literary references from TS Eliot to Ted Hughes. This non-fiction book and its style might not appeal to everyone, but I was utterly absorbed by it.

Some passages were so lyrical that I started typing them out to share. Before long, I had a list that would not fit the Instagram caption wordcount, so I decided it deserved its own full length blogpost, with an excerpted version for Instagram (@bluebottlebooks). 

“The grey heron has a balletic elegance and despite the constant risk of stumbling into slapstick, becomes the harpoonist, reaching through its own spine to hurl the javelin of itself.

“Around the quietly waiting birds the light is momentarily fierce; it glitters emerald on the moss, and silvers tussoks of rush. The heather appears dark and lifeless with only the ghosts of last summer’s flowers.”

“To stand in the stream under the Light Spout waterfall was to be drenched in sound and mesmerised by light. Shale ledges broke the flow of water; it was spun into a million bubbles filled with light so that, on a day like this, it looked like a shimmering apparition. In time, the sound that was, at first, all roar and splash became clearer and I began to her how the higher treble of the upper waterfall comprised hundreds of momentary notes shaken together by the energy of the flow into the lower bass notes of its entry to the pool.”

“Inside the woods, there is a profound, if tenuous, relief from the urbanised, industrialised, militarised world outside. This feeling of refuge may be a conservative rection that plays into post-Brexit ideas of British identity, but the greenwood also Echoes with a revolutionary view of community in Nature: a locally distinct, self-governing, supportive society.”

“Much of the greenwood virtues are currently expressed through medicalised notions of wellbeing. Forest schools reconnect children suffering from Nature Deficit Syndrome; green gyms provide therapeutic exercise through woodland management; the health benefits of a walk in the woods is supported by what the Japanese call shinrin-yoku — forest bathing: the phytoncides produced by trees to control microbial predation reduce depression and improve mental health in people. 

Trees affect the parasympathetic and sympathetic nerves; they increase the production of serum adoponectin, a hormone responsible for combating obseity and metabolic disorders.”

“Every return of an animal or plant is an ecological promise for the future. The deliberate reintroductions of beavers, red kites or large blue butterflies each strike against a nihilism that casts Nature as a patient in terminal decline. But what we have to remember is that these are wild creatures, not just symbols or tokens that can be brought back to right historical wrongs.”
Whilst some parts of the book offered political commentary, other parts continued to be intensely lyrical, as this.

“Life sought shadow and moved less until birdsong, hidden, sounded like whistling trees. The switfts brought new weather and a soft, scent-releasing rain. The suddenness in the sky was charged with swashbuckling clouds and a rain of birds that had arrived in time to chase the golden swarms and iridescent mayfly wings. These things were not just loose ephemera but essential elements of a seasonal shift which opened the sky to May.”

– Excerpts from “How to See Nature” by Paul Evans

I was reminded once again to pause and enjoy all the beauty of the garden shrubs and wildflowers that are in such abundance, even in this trying time of waiting and wanting.

May you also find beauty in the everyday grasses around us, and have a deeper awareness as we really see nature.