Nine by One
Nine things I found, learned or enjoyed this week
Art Work of the Week - Island of Patmos by Ivan Alvazovsky, 1854 - Some people think the Book of Revelations was written on the island of Patmos - this was a place of exile in early Christianity. I’m heading off to Loutro (Crete) soon for a writing retreat and there’s a beautiful white chapel on the headland. Last year we walked up there one evening and lay on the large stone table and benches, allowing our eyes to adjust to the dark. After twenty minutes, the rods in the back of the eye are fully online and it was just amazing on that moonless light to glimpse the sea through the trees, the pale starlight reflecting back to us.
An article that made me think - Hunting London’s lost rivers - I’ve always been fascinating by the vanished, partly because one day, they might be rediscovered. London has many lost rivers, The Fleet, The Westbourne, The Tyburn among them. I love the fact, if you know where to stand, you can hear the The Fleet rushing underneath the street from a manhole cover on Ray Street. It made me think of U. A. Fanthorpe’s wonderful poem, Rising Damp, also referencing these lost rivers.
Something I learned this week - England’s Ghost Woodlands - It was encouraging to hear that parts of the Howgills in the Yorkshire Dales are being planted with trees. What was intriguing is that despite these once wooded hillside being de-forested though clearance and sheep farming rendering them devoid of anything but grass, the ghost of the old wood lives on. Bluebells are popping up and there are patches of bracken, which suggest the soils and seed banks retain the memory of being a woodland despite hundreds of years of sheep grazing.
Something happy - Edith Pritchett’s Venn diagrams - I stumbled on the wonderful Edith Pritchett’s Venn diagrams this week and I love them. The three published in the Guardian this week made me laugh out loud.
Where I found hope this week - A new concept for fighting climate change - Robert McFarlane’s recent book about rivers suggesting it is better to think of rivers as alive, seems to be gathering ground. Robin Wall Kimmerer a Potawatomi botanist argues the reason we don’t default to this way of talking about rivers and other natural features is fundamentally a linguistic problem. English uses ‘it’ for objects - thus ‘a river that flows’ not ‘a river who flows’. I’m going to see if I can get into the habit of using this new language in future. Coincidentally, I had a long chat with Angela Jones today, the driving force behind Save the River Usk. She is completely inspiring and has sunk huge amounts of her time and her own money into the terrible harms being perpetrated on our local river by the local Water Company. You can support Angela’s work by making a contribution here. She isn’t funded by anyone, and has a team of volunteer water samplers - but the reagents they need are expensive.
Something inspiring - A Glow in the Consciousness - Maria Popova’s entirely brilliant ‘The Marginalian’ gave me this little gem. Nan Shepherd was a Scottish mountaineer and poet and I read her memoir ‘The Living Mountain’ years ago. I was particularly taken by this thought ‘How can I number the worlds to which the eye gives me entry?’ Exactly.
A poem to enjoy - Selling Watermelons by Andrei Voznesensky, translated by Edwin Morgan - Voznessensky was one of the poets who would perform in Mayakovsky Square to protest the post-Stalin regime in Moscow. It’s a reminder that poetry doesn’t have to be only lyrical or beautiful, it can also have a purpose. The way the poem zooms out to ‘the earth swings in its great string-bag / of meridians and latitudes!’ is magnificent.
A Substack to savour - Donald J. Robertson - Donald’s a cognitive-behavioural psychologist and writes books like ‘How to think like Socrates’. He makes the claim that in fact Stoicism is at the root of modern cognitive-behavioural therapy and since I’m always on the look out for decent life advice, it’s a brilliant addition to my reading list each week.
Music I enjoyed this week - Hania Rani - There’s something weird about needing music that burrows into my head then calms me down. I find her music mesmerising and if you’ve not listened to her you could start with my playlist.