Strands: A Year of Discoveries on the Beach by Jean Sprackland

In Strands, Jean Sprackland explores a year on a beach, specifically Aindsale Sands on the North West coast of England. The ‘Strands’ of the title is the strandline, the line at which debris gathered and deposited by the sea is left. It is a clever title as Sprackland explores the idea of leavings in more than one way: both the articles left and encountered on the beach and her own leaving, as she moves to a new life in London.

The book is portioned into the various seasons starting with spring, and each section explores different items that Sprackland discovered on the beach. It’s an eclectic mix: from shipwrecks to Neolithic footprints, a teacup lost from Cunard Lines, driftwood and sea squirts. It makes for an interesting blend, and is a great example of how focusing on one small area, in this case a beach, can uncover an extraordinary array of subjects. Weaving among the facts, Sprackland draws out many literary references exposing herself as a literary geek (which is always nice) with snippets from her own poems, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea, Longfellow to name but a few.

Her alter-ego as award winning poet also shines through in the quality of her writing. There’s a lyricism to it which belies its otherwise plain language. That’s the skill of a poet: making something wonderful from ordinary words. Like here, in the chapter ‘Denatured’:

“But living in a place like this, you get used to living with sand. The wind drives it inland, where it scours the paint off window frames and parked cars. Upend the laundry basket, tip out all the socks and T-shirts onto the kitchen floor; what remains is sand. Empty the vacuum cleaner and it’s there, mixed with the fluff and dust which is the detritus of our lives. Even then I know there is plenty more of it, invisibly embedded in the fibres of the carpet in the house. When I clear the place out and move away, this is what will be left behind: a forgotten lightbulb burning itself out in the cupboard under the stairs, the odd coin or hairgrip wedged between floorboards; and sand.”

Strands is a well researched and interesting book, and it certainly made me want to go out and start scouring the beach for interesting finds. Sprackland shows a keen eye and an interest in everything, a willingness to search and find, a sense of care for the wildness and unpredictability of the sea. It is a book of discoveries, of ideas and innovation, a book about exploring and seeking the wonder that is available to us so easily, if only we choose to go and look. It is a book about commitment, how returning to the same place over and over remains rewarding, the value of intimacy and attention.

Strands is a beautiful read. If you’re a lover of nature books (as I am fast becoming) it is one worth looking out for. It doesn’t quite have the extraordinary power of Kathleen Jamie’s writing as seen in Findings which covers a similar theme (and which Sprackland references nicely), it has a softer voice and a less stark, more peopled, feel to it. Despite this, is it still a fascinating book full of interesting information coupled with Sprackland’s unique and valuable perspective.

Strands receives a shored-up 7 out of 10 Biis. 

Findings by Kathleen Jamie

Earlier this year I discovered a penchant for nature writing, and since then I have been exploring different writers, sticking with my commitment to read female writers (though Rings of Saturn is calling me from the shelf. Next year, next year). Something about the wonderful cover of Findings called out to me - perhaps it was the sense of space, the starkness and freedom suggested by the lone peregrine banking over the hills. I’m immensely pleased it did.

Findings is something of a find (ha ha, do you get it?!); if you love books which are factual, observant, perceptive and beautifully written there is much to offer in this beautifully formed book. As a starting point Sort Of Books, the publishing house, have produced a beautiful book (I may mention here, as it’s worth mentioning, that Sort of Books also print some equally beautiful books by Tove Jansson). It is robust, it has a weightiness to it. The cover is striking yet hardy, which seems to encourage the idea of taking the book out there to read in the wilderness, the green mound of the world at your feet. Frankly the book is a work of art in itself, a pleasure to hold and a credit to any book shelf.

But I’ll stop gushing (but it is lovely) for a moment to tell you about the content, which is equally beautiful. In Findings, Kathleen Jamie casts a fresh eye over the seemingly ordinary, creating a book which is both a travel book and a nature book. Her prose is instantly arresting, as evidenced here in the opening chapter ‘Darkness and Light’:

“Mid-December, the still point of the turning year. It was eight in the morning and Venus was hanging like a wrecker’s light above the Black Craig. The hill itself – seen from our kitchen window – was still in silhouette, though the sky was lightening into a pale yellow-grey. It was a weakling light, stealing into the world like a thief through a window someone forgot to close.”

There is a lyricism to this prose, it seems to relax the reader into it; the literary equivalent of watching waves break gently on the shore. In the course of this first chapter, Jamie describes a visit to a Neolithic chambered cairn called Maes Howe on the day of the solstice, the only time when the light shines along the interior passageway and onto the tomb’s back wall. Whether Jamie was able to view this successfully is something I’ll leave for you to find out when you read the book yourself, but she describes the experience with great intelligence and humanity, focusing as much on the two men she finds surveying the tomb as on the history and mystery surrounding the tomb and its occupants.

Don’t be misled into thinking, however, that this book focuses solely on the natural world, though I think it’s fair to say that the focus is on observing the natural, with Jamie bringing a unique perspective and her beautiful prose to bear in drawing out things we might otherwise never have noticed. She discusses the peregrines and ospreys as they cling to their dwindling existence against the ever-present threat of human encroachment; she explores the Royal College of Surgeon’s, Surgeon’s Hall, with its macabre exhibits; she discusses her husband’s dice with death through fever, a memory prompted by encountering a spider’s web one morning. By far my favourite chapter was the title of the text, Findings, in which Jamie explores an uninhabited Scottish island and describes the things she finds there including a crashed aeroplane, multitudes of plastic, driftwood and the decaying body of a whale, which she describes here:

“It must have been on the shore a month or two, the whale, because it was half blanketed in the orange coloured weed. Half sinking or half emerging out of a bed of sand and weed. The body was rolled in the motion of a wave, and there was one dark orifice, like a cave, in its mouldering head, perhaps an eye socket. It was the heaviest creature I have ever seen, dead and out of the water’s buoyancy, a massive failure. I thought about touching it with just one finger, furtively, the way a gull pecks, and I wish now I had, because I’ve never touched a whale and probably won’t get the chance again.”

In many ways this typifies the character of the book. In one sense the subject matter is grim, macabre, and yet Jamie brings a kind of celebration to it. She asks us to view death with different eyes, to consider that which is cast off – a deformed limb, a gannet’s skull – for its potential. She does all this whilst bringing both an honesty and a freshness to every subject she encounters be it a decaying whale, a peregrine falcon, a stone circle or the Edinburgh skyline. In each encounter she marries the intellectual with the personal, sharing her own connection with the item or place alongside its own history. There is something very soothing about the way in which she conveys everything, she has a marvellous way with words and a unique ability to find the beauty and meaning in everything.

Findings is a wonderful book to read. It is sharp yet contemplative, a meditation in book form. One to own and one to read regularly.

Findings receives an inspirational 9 out of 10 Biis.    

Teaching a Stone to Talk (Expeditions and Encounters) by Annie Dillard

I’ve come to Annie Dillard late, I think. Being as she’s a Pullitzer Prize winner and all. Having come to her late, however, perhaps I appreciate her more? One thing’s for certain, after reading this short work I instantly went out and bought another three of Dillard’s works. As good an endorsement as any reader can give, I think. 

Teaching a Stone to Talk is a series of essays centred around the concept of encounters. It begins with Dillard’s encounter with a solar eclipse, something I can relate to having attended the solar eclipse that occurred over Cornwall and Devon in 1999. At the time I was pregnant with my first child, the son that will go on to eclipse me many times (and not just in height, though we are there already) and we combined the trip with a visit to my mother-in-law who lives in Brixham and picked out a good spot for us to view though didn’t, in the end, bother to view herself. Attending an eclipse is an encounter I can relate to, but what I didn’t expect was how fresh and vivid, how interesting a perspective Dillard, a great writer, could lend to the experience. Considering over fourteen years have elapsed since I experienced the eclipse, her prose and perspective brought it very much back to life for me.

It is the quality, the clarity and surety of Dillard’s writing which shines through in this book, the uniqueness of her perspective and keen observational skills, not just of events but of the vagaries of human nature and behaviour. In the second essay, An Expedition to the Pole, Dillard juxtaposes her visits to Catholic Mass against the experience of a polar expedition, and somehow this interspersal works in a way that I simply couldn’t have imagined (and I am not often accused of lack of imagination, though in this instance it may be an accurate accusation).

Though the course of the essays Dillard explores the Arctic, the Galapagos islands, the jungle, a field, Tinker Creek (which may be a familiar place to Dillard readers, a place she explores often and in great depth), the nature of mirages, mangrove swaps, a visit to a cabin in the woods with her daughter, an encounter with Santa Claus. Running through all these tales is a kind of meditative peace, an exploration of the world conducted largely without judgement but with a questing, open-mindedness of the kind I wished I had. These tales are not just encounters with the physical but with the spiritual, with the abstract, with ideas. Like here, from the essay In the Jungle:

“The point of going somewhere like the Napo River in Ecuador is not to see the most spectacular anything. It is simply to see what is there. We are here on the planet only once, and might as well get a feel for the place. We might as well get a feel for the fringes and hollows in which life is lived, for the Amazon basin which covers half a continent, and for the life that – there, like anywhere else – is always and necessarily lived in detail: on tributaries, in the riverside villages, sucking this particular white-fleshed guava in this particular pattern of shade.”

Each short essay was a distinct pleasure to read, a soothing moment in the travails of the day and I felt calmer and more peaceable for having read them. It also gave me more of an appreciation for what is around me, the glorious diversity of life and the way it is lived. Not many books do that for me, which is perhaps why I found myself wanting to read much more of it. Anything that makes us see the world around us as something beautiful, wondrous, that posits differences as something interesting to be explored as opposed to a threat or something to fear of be destroyed, well there should be more of it. I hope Dillard writes more and more and more.

Teaching a Stone to Talk receives a rarified 10 out of 10 Biis.

  

Reflections on writing: mindfulness

I’ve been thinking about mindfulness a lot recently. Or rather I have been thinking a lot about how mindfulness is cropping up a lot recently. It seems to be a bit of a buzz phrase, which is a shame because I find there’s a lot of value in being mindful but its prevalence in the daily media seems to be turning it into a parody of itself. I am thinking, in particular, of an article I read about the ‘mindfulness of eating’ which was referencing a new App by Headspace who seem to be turning the world mindful one activity at a time. The idea behind mindful eating is centred on taking time to experience and appreciate your food. Instead of just guzzling it down, take a moment to appreciate the sight and feel of your food, savour the different tastes and textures, hold it on your tongue, chew slowly, smell as well as taste. There’s a lot of merit in this advice, in fact it brings to mind the approach in Japanese fiction (not just Murakami, though Murakami readers will recognise him here) in which the protagonist prepares a simple meal in an almost ritualistic, procession-like manner to the point where even those who would generally balk at the idea of pickled cauliflower are left itching to take a bite. So I’m on board here, yet still I can’t shift that shuddery feeling that comes over me every time I hear the term. 

Perhaps it is the term itself that I struggle with the most. It has a catch-phrasy tone to it. In the past I have dabbled, frequently, with meditation. I enjoy meditation, though it was not always so. I find it settling, peaceful. Perhaps it is because I am often so busy, often planning every spare moment of my day - starting this, scheduling that – that even just ten minutes of sitting and simply existing, without focus or intent, brings me back to the experience of being...me. Not just a doing machine (I feel like this often). When I read Ruth Ozeki’s marvellous A Tale for the Time Being I enjoyed reading about how old Jiko helped Nao to develop a habit of sitting zazen which is another word for meditation, though of a particular type as espoused by Zen Master Dōgen. Yet this term mindfulness seems somehow unfitting, and perhaps its wide ranging application (you can be ‘mindful’ in pretty much anything) is what discomforts me so greatly. I am sure it is irrational, but there it is.

So whilst I have titled this blog ‘mindfulness’ I think it’s more true to say that what I’m interested in here is present awareness or in more blunt Northern-Englandy terms ‘paying attention’.  Whether or not you indulge in meditation (and I’ll get onto that, bear with me) there is significant value as a writer in spending time in this activity of paying attention to what is happening right here and right now. I think as we grow older we spend a lot of time learning to phase out the ‘unnecessary’, those things which are repetitious or commonplace, those things that don’t contribute towards what we are trying to do, where we are trying to go or what we want to achieve. We lose the childish appreciation of the world, where each experience is seen as new and unique. It is called ‘growing up’ and yet it seems a terrible punishment for growing older. For a writer such obliviousness is a handicap; failure to observe, to feel, to experience even the seemingly ordinary in life separates us from the richness of the world. It is often in these hidden spaces, in the minutiae of detail, from which great literature is born. One quality which unites all the greatest writers is their ability to see and elucidate those things that other people overlook, adding to it, of course, their unique perspective and insight and hopefully some sharply written prose.

Being mindful is harder than you imagine, just try spending the next ten minutes paying attention to everything that happens inside and outside of you. It’s exhausting. It’s also especially difficult in a world which seems to be moving, through the aid of technology, to a more virtual life experience. Think about all those people you see walking through the streets on their way to work in the morning, chatting away on their mobiles or walking staring at the screens as they send a text message or read the latest news or Facebook updates. This sight is now commonplace, and those of us who eschew such technology (I despise mobile phones) have become adept at avoiding collision with such people whose bodies may be present but whose minds are clearly inhabiting some different plane entirely. I do not blame them. I don’t think people can be faulted for becoming entranced with these magical little boxes which they did not invent and never asked for and which allow you instant access a dizzying array of things you never imagined existed or that you wanted.  Yet I also think it is true that such technologies go a long way towards separating us from experiencing the world that we are in now; they engender a weirdly passive yet searching mentality, in which we go seeking the next thing to absorb or to react to: a tweet that enrages or a comment that demands a response. I know this to be true because I have experienced it; I am not beyond the allure of the internet, the way it instantaneously gratifies or outrages. I have spent many hours reading twitter feeds or internet articles, checking for e-mails or messages. Yet I also know it is dead activity, that to unearth my creative and creating self I need to be here and present and alert to what is happening.

I think this is perhaps why mindfulness has become such a thing recently, that people need gently reminding that they are more than just all-consuming beings, being fed information or experiences or goods at a distance. That it is easy to spend your entire life reaching out for something, when the really valuable experience is right here, in this moment, the one you are living. I recognise the irony in communicating this via an internet blog. In a way I’m saying the best thing you can do is stop reading and start feeling and experiencing.  In a moment, of course, when you’ve finished reading what I have to say. Pay attention.  

This is what mindfulness is about, and perhaps I have not explained entirely clearly why I think it is so important a tool if you’re setting out to be a writer, perhaps because I think, at its root, mindfulness is a valuable tool for life. But for a writer it is particularly valuable because it enables you to take time to empty yourself of all influences, forget the article that enraged you or the odd comment your mother left on your Facebook post, and let yourself become open to what is happening right now. It enables you to focus more closely on how you are feeling, unusual tensions in the body or perhaps a general sense of sadness or joy. It enables you to notice the little things: warmth, a soft breeze, an ache in your left shoulder (that’s me), the sounds of the air conditioning or heating running through the pipes in your building,  the regular ticking of your heart, the sensation of cloth on your knee, the way your body quivers unexpectedly when you sit cross-legged, the way the mind wanders, how it roams curiously seeking out experience, experience that, on the whole, you largely block out. All these things become present and clear and suddenly you start to see yourself forming from the blank space where your outward seeking – defensive mind would normally be. Subjects, reflections, meaning begin to form, not reactions but identity. Maybe your mind wanders to that argument you had with your partner that morning and you start to see what it was about what they did (or didn’t do) that enraged you, not the thing itself but the source of your own insecurity, your fear. And the great part about meditating, about mindfulness, is how it is not about dwelling on these things or judging, but about acknowledging their existence. That’s all. Translate that activity into story-writing and you have a path towards a great observational piece in which you don’t judge or steer your characters too heavily but instead allow them to unfold and create the story through their actions. Suddenly you have show not tell, that great and often shared piece of writerly advice. And those little details are the difference between writing that is superficial and a story that is authentic. Those little details are what makes stories worth reading.

I wouldn’t recommend that anyone tries mindfulness because it is cool or popular or the buzz phrase of the minute. It is more difficult and in some respects much too scary to attempt lightly. When I tried it with my daughter she found it very discomforting, and it has taken me many years of trying before coming to feel at peace when meditating and I don’t doubt there will be future occasions when no matter what I try I can’t settle to it. It is not predictable or easy. But if you’re interested in becoming a writer, it is a powerful way of revealing to you your own feelings, of being present and observant and receptive to what the world has to say which makes it a valuable tool and a worthwhile activity, even if only used occasionally. 

Reflections on writing: go for a jolly good walk

I’ve always liked to walk. As a child I used to walk to school or across the fields and in the hills. The town I grew up in is in a sharp valley in the Peak District and it was never possible to walk anywhere without encountering an incline of some description. My parents didn’t own a car, so if I wanted to go anywhere it was by my legs or, on rare occasions, by bus. In winter heavy snowfall made the roads impassable and it was uncommon for the school to close so I would often tramp the mile or two to school across fields deep with crisp, untouched snow, or in summer thick with meadow grasses and bobbing yellow buttercups.

At some point this became a pleasure, I began to walk for the love of it. Often as a teenager I would climb to the top of the hill behind my house, winding my way through housing estates until the pressure of housing thinned and the path broke out into open moorland, tangled with woody heathers and bilberry bushes with their tiny purple fruits. Then there would be no sounds of cars or people chattering, no lawnmowers, just the drifting notes of birdsong and the bleating of sheep and the wind in my ears and, sometimes, the cry of a bird of prey scouring the bleak hills somewhere. When I crested the rise of the hill the fields opened out onto a broad valley with the thin streak of a road splitting it like a grey gash down the centre, too far away to carry any sound, and the great empty hills grazing the sky in the distance. I would lie down on the rough, thin grass avoiding the clustered pellets of sheep turd and watch the clouds pass. It was the most peaceful aspect of my childhood, the moment when I felt most complete and most myself, untouched by the tainting influence of other people. I’d grown up in a large family, one which had become distended with extras: the in-laws and the nieces and nephews and cousins, and it was often hard to find a moment in which I, the youngest child, could start to untangle who I really was from the narrative of what everyone expected me to be. 

I have maintained that relationship with walking, though I have moved away from the valley (how I miss it at times) and life and responsibilities mean that it is harder for me to go walking freely as I used to. I also have problems with my feet, which it turns out were not really designed for walking, so my ability to walk distance is not what it used to be when I was a tiny stripling of a kid, light as a leaf. Lack of familiarity with my new surroundings has also been a barrier: no longer do I have a stomping ground of familiar trails and with limited time it is hard to discover new ones. I am not a fan of walking in urban or suburban environments, though I don’t mind talking a stroll around the village now and again. My childhood spoiled me, I think. I am not satisfied without greenery, without wildness. I well understand the power of the moors on the work of the Brontës, how it became a kind of character in its own right much as Tove Jansson’s island does. I want a confusion of birdsong and the gurgle of a swift-running stream; I want great lakes shielding secrets in their placid waters, hills like a rumpled quilt left behind by passionate lovers. The city doesn’t do that for me, not quite.

That being said, there is value in walking. It is not just physically beneficial, but also supportive of the writerly lifestyle. I don’t mean as an affectation, but rather as a tool. Exercise of any description releases endorphins, a chemical change which has a significant impact on the mindset. Yet unlike cycling or swimming, running, football or hockey, walking absorbs the body but not the mind. When you walk, the mind is free to wander. This is a great opportunity for budding (or experienced) writers to explore ideas or seek inspiration, to puzzle out a difficult scene. At a recent short break in Wales I had only to walk for 10 to 15 minutes on the banks of a lake to generate two good ideas for stories and to puzzle out an understanding of imagery which had eluded me.

Unlike most other physical activities, walking doesn’t require a high level of physical fitness. You don’t have to walk fast, you can amble or stroll. You don’t have to walk far or with any particular purpose in mind. Just move your feet, one then another then another, and let the mind roam free. Or observe intently, letting the environment inspire and prompt you.   

It is, perhaps, not surprising then that there is a connection between writers and walking. There are innumerable examples of writers who are/were regular walkers. Virginia Woolf, for example, was a frequent walker exploring the banks and the countryside surrounding the River Ouse close to her home at Rodmell. William Wordsworth’s famous poem ‘Daffodils’ came out of a walk. Then there are writers who write about walking: Henry David Thoreau, Bill Bryson, W.G. Sebald, Sheryl Strayed, Olivia Laing, Simon Armitage to name but a sampling. The connection between the activities is strong.

It is not just writing that walking aids, but any problem that requires thinking. If you have a knotty personal problem to iron out, take a hike up into the hills feeling your lungs fill with air and strain against the effort, walk until your body is tired and your mind subdued and then, perhaps, a path to resolution will become evident. Much is said about mindfulness in these enlightened days, and a mindful walk can be a great way of breathing presence into the present moment: that flower growing from the crack in the pavement, the way the discarded lumps of chewing gum form a crazy multicoloured pattern, the splash of streetlights on a wet pavement, all these things can remind us how we are here and how life, in all its complexity and chaos, is still beautiful. Walking in the rain can be soothing or exhilarating. Walking in a storm can be terrifying. Walking, whatever the weather wherever you are, makes you feel something which is invariably better than feeling nothing.

It’s a great, big, beautiful world out there. Take a walk in it. Who knows what you’ll see.