Working With the Curlew

ROBINSON Trevor A Farmhand's Life:

ISBN 10: 1903998344 / ISBN 13: 9781903998342

Published by Totnes. Green Books. 2003., 2003

About this Item

First edition, paperback. Book is in Very Good condition. SIGNED by the author, without dedication, on the title page. Illustrated by Jane Hassall.

Seller Inventory # 29508

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Working With the Curlew
• Publisher: Totnes. Green Books. 2003.
• Publication Date: 2003
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1903998344
• ISBN 13: 9781903998342
• Binding: Soft cover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)
• Seller catalogs:
  • Autobiography

About this title

Synopsis

An intimate and evocative account of an era when farmers worked closely with nature and the rhythm of the seasons.

In Working with the Curlew, Trevor Robinson tells the story of his life as a shepherd on the moor at Great Whernside in Yorkshire and later as a farmhand near Leominster in Hereford. Trevor celebrates the intricate details of traditional farm life, from the village hop, cheese and bread making and trout-tickling, to muck spreading, lambing and sheep shearing.

During one severe Yorkshire winter six hundred sheep were lost, and he had to leave the job he loved; 'the call of the curlew was still over two months away, when it came I was not there to hear it'. His new job in Herefordshire brought different skills: hedge laying, ploughing matches, haymaking, chain harrowing and crop rotation, and inevitably, the arrival of tractor and combine harvester.

Before factory farming, smallholdings sustained entire families and there were enough small farms for a shepherd to climb the ladder to ownership. Working with the Curlew beautifully honours those peaceful yet lively times.

About the Author

Trevor Robinson was born in Huddersfield in 1930, and worked as a shepherd and farmhand in the Yorkshire Dales and Herefordshire from the age of eight. He lives with his wife in Worcestershire.