Ronald Blythe lives at the end of an overgrown farm track deep in the rolling countryside of the Stour Valley,on the border between Suffolk and Essex. His home is Bottengoms Farm,a sturdy yeoman's house once owned by the artist John Nash. From here,Blythe has spent almost half a century observing the slow turn of the agricultural year,the church year,and village life in a series of rich,lyrical rural diaries.
Beginning with the arrival of snow on New Year's Day and ending with Christmas carols sung in the village church, Next to Nature invites us to witness a simple life richly lived. With gentle wit and keen observation Blythe meditates on his life and faith,on literature,art and history,and on our place in the landscape.
It is a celebration of one of our greatest writers,and an unforgettable ode to the English countryside.
Publisher: John Murray PressISBN: 9781399804691Number of pages: 480Weight: 380 gDimensions: 196 x 128 x 36 mm
MEDIA REVIEWS
'England's greatest living country writer'-Independent
'Blythe's observations of nature are as unforced as breathing,and his descriptions are precise,celebratory and unexpected.... (he) seduces even the irreligious reader into an appreciation of the meshing of the temporal and the timeless'- Guardian
'(Ronald Blythe) is an English institution... he lives with a deep,authentic sense of wonder'-TLS
'Some of the most beautiful and precise prose in modern English... an expansive exploration of how land scapes,humans,and words interact,touched with great humanity...he is our tribal storyteller,plugged into a common stream of inquisitive conversation that joins us as a species'- Richard Mabey
'One of the great prose stylists on the twentieth century... a modern Hazlitt'- Mark Cocker
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