The Story of More, Our Story Begins

"All human beings are a lot better at describing what is happening than at predicting what will happen. Somewhere along the way, however, we began to hope that scientists were different - that they could be right all the time. And because they're not, we kind of stopped listening."

Under the Sky We Make

"We are living under the sky we make. We have made it with our behaviour, and we can remake it that way too."

Finally opened my eyes to what is actually happening to this planet (what we've done to it) and it's terrifying but it's not too late, not yet.

Crocuses Emerge from Damp Soil

But there is hope in it. Crocuses, beloved as early harbingers of spring, stand out, a little pool of brightness in a sea of drab. That combination of rich purple and zinging orange is an antidote to gloom.

I hope you can find some crocuses this week.

Clear Light Shines Through Mist

Spring is round the corner, but the corner is long.

English Pastoral: An Inheritance, Progress

Read the whole book.

new farming had taken two mutually beneficial things - grazing animals and fertilizing fields - and separated them to create two massive industrial-scale problems ... farms with thousands of animals had more muck than their land could possibly accommodate, while crop farmers now had no animals, and thus no muck to fertilize plants

English Pastoral: An Inheritance, Nostalgia

Read the whole book.

As I sat in the back of the tractor watching the seagulls, it felt as if Grandad and the seagulls behind his plough were part of the same whole, the one as true as the other. They both had timeless claims on the earth; they both belonged to the same cycle in that landscape.

Lab Girl

Just popping this book on my wishlist.

A plant that lives where it should not is simply a pest, but a plant that thrives where it should not live is a weed. We don't resent the audacity of the weed, as every seed is audacious; we resent its fantastic success.

Art & Fear, Chapter I

In large measure becoming an artist consists of learning to accept yourself, which makes your work personal, and in following your own voice, which makes your work distinctive.

Art & Fear, Introduction

Making art is a common and intimately human activity, filled with all the perils (and rewards) that accompany any worthwhile effort. The difficulties artmakers face are not remote and heroic, but universal and familiar.

The Concise Guide to Self-Sufficiency, Chapter 1

Cows are not the problem with our world. Over-farming of cows is. Over-farming of everything is. Cows are great for the planet when done properly.

"It is no secret that rotting cow manure is the very best source of 'humus' which will make your garden give a bumper disease-free harvest. The cow is nature's superb storehouse of beneficial bacteria which magically transform grass into protein."

The Concise Guide to Self-Sufficiency, Chapter 1

I always wondered why I couldn't find my 'one thing'.

"We were not meant to be a one-job animal. We do not thrive as parts of a machine. We are intended by nature to be diverse, to do diverse things, to have many skills."

walkhighlands.co.uk

Ever find yourself poking around the Internet, pursuing mere notions of interest, only to discover glistening gems of sentences?

On the summit of Ben Hee, with a cloud bank surfing over rock-swell and waves of snow-sharpened ridges and summits heaving up close by, I saw the three coasts of Scotland. 

[https://www.walkhighlands.co.uk/news/who-goes-there-mapping-extreem-wildernes/0018781]

ReWild, chapter 4

...since it is the sun we're talking about, when we're slowly rolled away from it...

This is, first, a beautiful book, much nicer than the pictures. It's also lovely to read. It sounds like Nick Baker is just sitting opposite you, chatting away, full of passion and information.

The Cloudspotter's Guide, chapter 5

Clouds are Nature's poetry, spoken in a whisper in the rarefied air between crest and crag.

This is an exceptional read if you love clouds, which the author (and creator of the Cloud Appreciation Society) clearly does. I'm struggling to learn much, however, as the information keeps meandering into story.

The Time Traveller's Guide to Medieval England, chapter 1

My favourite bit so far:

You will also find [in London in the fourteenth century] a communal running water supply - fed through a series of conduits... On certain special occasions the conduits are even made to run with wine - for example, on the arrival of the captive king of France in 1357, or to celebrate the coronation of Henry IV in 1399.

How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy, chapter 5

The writers's self-image. Writers have to simultaneously believe the following two things:

1. The story I am now working on is the greatest work of genius ever written in English.
2. The story I am now working on is worthless drivel.

[Believing 1 as you're sending and 2 as you're editing, etc.]

How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy, chaper 1

You know when you think you shouldn't bother to create something because it's already been done 1 million times?

The novelty and freshness you'll bring to the field won't come from the new ideas you think up. Truly new ideas are rare, and usually turn out to be variations on old themes anyway. No, your freshness will come from the way you think, from the person you are; it will invariably show up in your writing, provided you don't mask it with heavy-handed formulas or clichés.

How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy, chapter 1

The Infinite Boundary

...whatever is published within the field of science fiction and fantasy is science fiction and fantasy, and if it doesn't resemble what science fiction and fantasy were twenty years ago, some readers and writers will howl, but others will hear the new voice and see the new vision with delight. 

On Clichés, introduction

Written in 1979:

Daily speech, for example, tends to loose its substance of meaning when a society modernises. As a result, the art of conversation is increasingly forgotten. Instead, modern man has become a virtuoso in chatter...

You're Never Weird on the Internet (Almost), chapter 9

Never put yourself down about things that you create. That mean voice inside you that says, 'You're not good enough' is not your friend, okay? I used to hear that voice all the time. If I hadn't started ignoring it, I wouldn't be here right now.

There are enough negative forces in this world - don't let the pessimistic voice that lives inside you get away with that stuff, too.