Underland: A Deep Time Journey - Hardcover

Macfarlane, Robert

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0241143802 ISBN 13: 9780241143803

Publisher: Hamish Hamilton, 2019

Synopsis

WINNER OF THE WAINWRIGHT GOLDEN BEER BOOK PRIZE 2019

A Guardian Best Book of the 21st Century

The highly anticipated new book from the internationally bestselling, prize-winning author of Landmarks, The Lost Words and The Old Ways

'You'd be crazy not to read this book' The Sunday Times

'Underland is a magnificent feat of writing, travelling and thinking that feels genuinely frontier pushing, unsettling and exploratory' Evening Standard

'Marvellous... Neverending curiosity, generosity of spirit, erudition, bravery and clarity... This is a book well worth reading' The Times

'Extraordinary... at once learned and readable, thrilling and beautifully written' Observer

'Attentive, thoughtful, finely honed... I turned the last page with the unusual conviction of having been in the company of a fine writer who is - who must surely be - a good man' Telegraph

'Poetry, science, a healthy sense of the uncanny and a touch of the shamanic are the hallmarks of his writing... This is a journey that tells the story not just of nature but of human nature. And there is noone I would more gladly follow on it' i

'Startling and memorable, charting invisible and vanishing worlds. Macfarlane has made himself Orpheus, the poet who ventures down to the darkest depths and returns - frighteningly alone-to sing of what he has seen' New Statesman

Discover the hidden worlds beneath our feet...

In Underland, Robert Macfarlane takes us on a journey into the worlds beneath our feet. From the ice-blue depths of Greenland's glaciers, to the underground networks by which trees communicate, from Bronze Age burial chambers to the rock art of remote Arctic sea-caves, this is a deep-time voyage into the planet's past and future. Global in its geography, gripping in its voice and haunting in its implications, Underland is a work of huge range and power, and a remarkable new chapter in Macfarlane's long-term exploration of landscape and the human heart.

'Macfarlane has invented a new kind of book, really a new genre entirely' The Irish Times

'He is the great nature writer, and nature poet, of this generation' Wall Street Journal

'Macfarlane has shown how utterly beautiful a brilliantly written travel book can still be' Observer onThe Old Ways

'Irradiated by a profound sense of wonder... Few books give such a sense of enchantment; it is a book to give to many, and to return to repeatedly' Independent on Landmarks

'It sets the imagination tingling...like reading a prose Odyssey sprinkled with imagist poems' The Sunday Times onThe Old Ways

About this title

Review

a brilliant, thrilling, terrifying work of literature, making me want to think more adventurously and live more deeply. (Amy Liptrot)

All Macfarlane's books are urgings to take a closer look at the environment we live in, and at the natural world especially. They are perception-shifters. And with its darker, delving subject matter counter-weighing its lyricism, Underland is a magnificent feat of writing, travelling and thinking that feels genuinely frontier-pushing, unsettling and exploratory (Evening Standard)

Robert Macfarlane is a magician with words. In Underland he shows us how to see in the dark. His writing is like a vortex... Once caught, you're pulled deeper and deeper with each page (Andrea Wulf, best-selling author of 'The Invention of Nature')

Devastating, lyrical, blazingly vivid... An examination of the darknesses invisible beneath our feet. The book's great power comes from Macfarlane's deliberate turn away from despair and toward a deliberate, loving, and luminous sense of awe (Lauren Groff)

Robert Macfarlane's writing reminds us of the astonishing variety of things you can see when you go at walking speed, and of how strange and rich the world is (Philip Pullman)

The great nature writer, and nature poet, of this generation (Wall Street Journal)

Exquisite. [Robert Macfarlane] evokes so vividly places to which I and probably you will never go, and at the eeriness of the places themselves and the sense of vast scale they restore to us at a time when it can feel like the world has shrunken around us (Rebecca Solnit)

An epic descent into a series of underground and underwater landscapes (Financial Times)

Beautifully written and wise, this haunting book is a treasure... It reads like a seamless dive, crawl, and trek through deep time, in sense-rich landscapes, accompanied by fascinating views of the human saga. Its unique spell is irresistible (Diane Ackerman)

Beautifully and bravely balanced... This is a radical book in every sense. It goes as deep as it can, unafraid of the risk that what it finds will turn everything on its head (The Oldie)

About the Author

Robert Macfarlane is the author of Mountains of the Mind, The Wild Places, The Old Ways, Landmarks, and The Lost Words, co-created with Jackie Morris. Mountains of the Mind won the Guardian First Book Award and the Somerset Maugham Award and The Wild Places won the Boardman-Tasker Award. Both books have been adapted for television by the BBC. The Lost Words won the Books Are My Bag Beautiful Book Award and the Hay Festival Book of the Year. He is a Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge, and writes on environmentalism, literature and travel for publications including the Guardian, the Sunday Times and The New York Times.

Edition details

• Publisher: Hamish Hamilton
• Publication date: 2019
• ISBN 10: 0241143802
• ISBN 13: 9780241143803
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 496