Thursday 21 July 2011

Walnut Tree Farm

Roger Deakin's "Notes From Walnut Tree Farm" has taken up residence on my bedside table for most of the time since I first read it a year or so ago. It's the ideal volume for dipping into at odd moments - I  still keep finding new things in there! Roger Deakin also wrote two other books, "Waterlog" and "Wildwood", both of which are also excellent, but somehow "Walnut Tree Farm" is the one which I find myself re-reading.

For the last six years of his life Mr Deakin kept journals mostly centred on the farm which he bought in a fairly derelict state many years previously. Extracts from these diaries have been arranged to give a picture of a typical year. In many ways it reads like a rather superior blog, as one keeps learning new things about the author and his views.

It soon becomes apparent that he has a rather idiosyncratic lifestyle - newts make their way across his study floor; he goes swimming in an old moat; he makes sculptures using a chainsaw; he often sleeps in an old shepherds' hut. His journals are similarly undisciplined, erratic and colourful; full of reminiscences, ideas, reflections, art, history, ecology, poetry.....

But each anecdote and observation, like individual brushstrokes, builds a picture of who Roger Deakin is and, to paraphrase Loudon Wainwright's song, tells you "what he stands for and what he just can't stand". It also reveals his vision of the English landscape which has been formed, not by academic study, but by getting close to the land by working on it. It's no accident that we meet him, at the start of the book, laying on the cold ground blowing into a fire to get it started. And his story is soon crackling and flaring up, fanned by his restless imagination and gentle humour.

His landscape is a welcome antidote to what I call the National Trustification of the British countryside. That over-fussy, manicured type of scenery which has no real purpose other than to look nice to the casual passer-by. Roger Deakin lives in his landscape and everything has a real function, however whimsical and unpredictable that may be. 

This book will certainly entertain and maybe give you new ways to look at and appreciate the world around you. For another review and a woderful photo of Roger at his farmhouse door  click on this

11 comments:

  1. This sounds like a really interesting read - glad you shared it, I must look out for it!

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  2. I will definitely look for this book in the many that come through my store. There is also a used book store in town...I may have my girlfriend take a stroll around and see if she has a copy. Thanks for the recommendation, John!

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  3. I agree - sounds like a good book but it's a matter of finding it here in Australia.

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  4. I have all his books, John or rather I did until my son (Dominic Rivron on my side bar) 'borrowed' them. He is a wild swimmer and found waterlog fascinating.

    I am a great fan of Ronald Blythe's writing (Word from Wormingford etc..) and he was a dear friend of Roger Deakin. I think Deakin was eally a total one off - and i love his work for that reason. It is nice to meet another fan.

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  5. I haven't had chance to stop by this week - missed some good posts. I liked all the windows, laughed at the quotes (especially the supermarket one!) and must seek out this book, it sounds good. Have a good weekend John.

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  6. I hope you all manage to find the book - in a bookshop, on Amazon, second-hand or by daring raid on the home of Dominic! Ironically Roger Deakin himself has a short rant in the book about the fact that he is unable to obtain works by Australian writers here in the UK.

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  7. I read 'Notes From Walnut Tree Farm' 2 or 3 years ago and really enjoyed it. Have you read Robert Macfarlane's 'The Wild Places'? I suspect you'd enjoy that too.

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  8. Now you're not going to believe this John but I actually found "Notes from Walnut Tree Farm" here in my local library!! they also have "Wildwood" but it is out on loan. Amazing!

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  9. Sounds like a book I need : )

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  10. I think I've met this author's name before--sounds like someone I should read. I'm pleased when fellow bloggers suggest a book they've enjoyed.

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