Amber Massie-Blomfield
Posts by Amber Massie-Blomfield
The Rings of Saturn | W.G. Sebald
The Marriage of Cadmus and Harmony | Roberto Calasso
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead | Olga Tokarczuk
The Overstory | Richard Powers
Q&A with Rob HopkinsLiz Jensen
First, have the dream. Then make it happen. In conversation with Liz Jensen, Rob Hopkins, founder of the Transitions Movement and author of What If to What Next: Unleashing the Power of Imagination to Create the Future We Want discusses the power of the imagination and how stories can frame the future we want, […]
Almost Invisible AngelsJay Griffiths & Mark Rylance
In Almost Invisible Angels, Jay Griffiths & Sir Mark Rylance speak out in praise of insects. Original score composed & performed by Sam Lee & Anna Phoebe. “They do not take the title of angels, being by nature bashful and unassuming, they go by other names – firefly, bee, ant, caddisfly – I wish that everyone who […]
Read More… from Almost Invisible AngelsJay Griffiths & Mark Rylance
The Nutmeg’s Curse: Parables for a Planet in Crisis | Amitav Ghosh
Loss Soup & Other Stories | Nick Hunt
After Ithaca | Charlotte Du Cann
Frequencies at DuskJane Smith
Twenty of us stood masked and slightly nervous in the brightly-lit prefab hut, ready to be initiated into a whole new world of nocturnal life. Phil from the local bat group showed us photos of brown long-eared bats, talked about bat altruism and touched on the wonder of the nursery roosts he’d seen. He […]
In Case of Medical Climate Emergency, Break GlassAnouchka Grose
COLLECTIVE ACTION OR COLLECTIVE SUICIDE One of the many alarming aspects of this latest heatwave is that you can link it to the climate emergency without anyone trying to make you feel crazy. For the long-time eco-anxious amongst us, this is more than a little disconcerting. Having been treated like lunatics for decades, suddenly […]
Read More… from In Case of Medical Climate Emergency, Break GlassAnouchka Grose
Un-fashioning the FutureTansy Hoskins
The fashion industry has a disjointed relationship with the future. It is an industry that is simultaneously obsessed with constructing what comes next, but at the same time refuses to look ahead and realise that business as usual offers nothing but a full scale rush into disaster. Research by the McKinsey consultancy firm found […]
Charlotte Du Cann Q&ASally OReilly
Charlotte Du Cann speaks to Writer’s Rebel’s Sally OReilly about her new book, After Ithaca – Journeys in Deep Time. Described by head Rebel Librarian Matt Rose as “part memoir, part essay, part travelogue – that follows a real life journey of descent in a world on the tip of crisis”, Charlotte’s work pulls from […]
Ghost MooseHilary Menos
The moose haunts my dreams, his palmate rack begging me for alms, or succour, or release. Now he stands at the end of my bed in the dark, chewing cud. I must scare him to save him as the men here kill rogue moose, their rifles cocked, their wool caps low on their heads. […]
ColourlessRebecca Stonehill
only that it’s becoming unmanageable; that much, only, do I know. And more than knowing – I feel it, in the corals bleaching and leaching of colour, in the thud of trunks as they hit the floor of ancient forests, in the vapour trails that crisscross the skies like angry scars, in the face […]
Dandelions on the CommonCraig Smith
There are new dandelions on the Common. The spindly stalks of these coin-sized supernova can barely lift their heads from the ground, today being November and the season for dandelions long being over. One weekend, three years back, the boy and I questioned how the solar rays of dandelion petals switched modes to become […]
Rebugging the Planet Vicki Hird
As my older son emerged dripping from the lake with a leech on his foot my excitement was infectious enough to send his brother wading back into the icy waters to get one of his own. I’m not suggesting blood-sucking leeches should be loved by everyone. That’s probably taking it too far. But if […]
Persons Unknown: Q&A with Simon CrumpSally O'Reilly
In 2012 Sheffield City Council and the Department of Transport signed a 25-year contract with Amey plc to renew the city’s highways in a programme called ‘Streets Ahead’, at a cost to the taxpayer of £2.2 billion. As part of this contract, some 17,500 trees were due to be felled, most of them healthy. […]
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One Foot in Front of the Other: Walking for Climate and Ecological Justice Helena Smith
In July 2021, I read about an Extinction Rebellion group which was planning to walk from London to Glasgow for the COP summit. Much like the historic Camino to Santiago in Spain, the walk was intended to symbolise a path for meditation and growth, and also to connect, not just with nature but […]
InsectsJay Griffiths
Sometimes it is dreams that do it. Sometimes it is facts. So it was with this film. Sometimes, half-waking, an image is given to us, just like a dream-vision. I was on the tricksy sweet edge of sleep, when I saw Tintern Abbey in its woodland home, filled with insect-angels, and the Red Rebels: […]