{"id":5176,"date":"2022-09-18T16:38:00","date_gmt":"2022-09-18T16:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/?p=5176"},"modified":"2023-05-09T16:41:50","modified_gmt":"2023-05-09T16:41:50","slug":"robert-macfarlane-the-lost-words","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/2022\/09\/18\/robert-macfarlane-the-lost-words\/","title":{"rendered":"Robert MacFarlane: The Lost Words"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The story behind The Lost Words<\/em> (2017) by Robert MacFarlane, and illustrated by Jackie Morris, is a sad one for lovers of language whose childhood was steeped in nature. In the mid-noughties the Oxford Junior Dictionary, while modernising its lexicon, dropped words based on their lack of concept to young minds of the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Lost Words<\/em>, then, is an attempt to summon those abandoned by way of \u2018spells\u2019, short acrostics riffing on words from nature, like lark, weasel, and ivy, that capture the wonder of the meaning behind those words. The effect of these incantations is to call back nature, not to summon but to recognise it once more.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From \u2018acorn\u2019 to \u2018wren\u2019 the natural world is explored. The beauty of the dandelion, despite its unfair billing as \u2018Bane of Lawn Perfectionists\u2019 is rediscovered in old names, like Evening Glow, Milkwitch, and Windblow. The heron (\u201cwreaked from blue and beaked with steel\u201d) has a militancy balanced with its wisdom. The idea of a conker as a work of art that no artisan (\u201cNever. Not a chance. No hope at all.\u201d) could ever craft.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s not just evocations of lost words, but invitations to seek out and be in nature. In \u2018adder\u2019 we see clues left of its presence. Although the \u2018willow\u2019 will \u201cnever whisper to you\u201d, there\u2019s no harm in listening. And encouraging a \u201crun to the riverbank\u201d in a dream of being an otter as \u201cyou\u2019ll only ever spot a shadow-flutter\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The accompanying illustrations by Morris show these lost words in their habitat. The images span the sizable pages of the book, often double-page spreads sans words. And each word\u2019s title page with stylised images hinting at the detail overleaf. Birds in hedgerows; a newt at swim in its watery expanse; a moor of fiery heather populated by hawk and hunted hare. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The observation of the artist should be what the child sees today to understand the world around them. If these words are being lost, this is a call to arms for rediscovery. As cities unfold like \u2018fern\u2019 across the landscape, nature is still there on the fringe: (\u201cBramble is on the march again\/Rolling and arching along the hedges, into parks on the city edges.) The connection to \u201cbowls of bright blackberries\u201d needs reinstated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The story behind The Lost Words (2017) by Robert MacFarlane, and illustrated by Jackie Morris, is a sad one for lovers of language whose childhood was steeped in nature. In the mid-noughties the Oxford Junior Dictionary, while modernising its lexicon, dropped words based on their lack of concept to young minds of the day. The Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5179,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[278],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5176","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-macfarlane-robert"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/09\/41nBcLokdWL._SX368_BO1204203200_-2.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Pon-1lu","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5176","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5176"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5176\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5178,"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5176\/revisions\/5178"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5176"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5176"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.booklit.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5176"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}