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A review by nicktomjoe
Antlers of Water: Writing on the Nature and Environment of Scotland by Kathleen Jamie
4.0
Challenging, enlightening, this collection of essays, poems and visual art is, as Kathleen Jamie the editor asserts, from people who “do not pretend Scotland is pristine.” And with that we plunge into Red Kites and wind turbines, ravens and sexism, the rise and fall of wildlife populations, the making of lyric and music on Fair Isle. Perhaps it is over-ambitious in setting such a wide scope, but the ambition is at least laudable, and certainly intriguing.
My favourite essay reflects on a mound called Diarmaid’s Grave, on mythic pasts and semi-derelict cottages: “Stories attach themselves to ancient sites...” admitting that this could be anything from a Bronze Age cairn to a pile of stones cleared from the infield but that it was the story of Diarmaid that put the people who’d lived there “in their place” - and it is this sense of place and the dynamics of human and non-human interactions that this book so vividly explores.
My favourite essay reflects on a mound called Diarmaid’s Grave, on mythic pasts and semi-derelict cottages: “Stories attach themselves to ancient sites...” admitting that this could be anything from a Bronze Age cairn to a pile of stones cleared from the infield but that it was the story of Diarmaid that put the people who’d lived there “in their place” - and it is this sense of place and the dynamics of human and non-human interactions that this book so vividly explores.