Women on Nature

“An entertaining and eclectic anthology of nature writing by women about the ‘east Atlantic archipelago’ or British isles.… For readers in search of a new take on the genre, this is a great place to start.” —Publishers Weekly

Now in paperback—a landmark gathering of writing, by women, about the natural world

Women, through the centuries and to present time, writing about the natural world, in this landmark anthology—with pieces gathered from works of fiction, poetry, but also household planners, gardening diaries, recipe books…

For the very first time, this anthology collects together the work of women, over the centuries and up to the present day, who have written about the natural world in Britain, Ireland and the outlying islands of that archipelago. Alongside the traditional forms of the travelog, the walking guide, books on birds, plants and wildlife, Women on Nature embraces alternative modes of seeing and recording that turn the genre on its head.

Katharine Norbury has sifted through the pages of women’s writing to show the multitude of ways in which they have observed the natural world about them, from the fourteenth-century writing of the anchorite nun Julian of Norwich to the seventeenth-century travel journal of Celia Fiennes; from the keen observations of Emily Brontë to a host of brilliant contemporary voices.

Women on Nature presents a groundbreaking vision of the natural world which, in addition to being a rich and scintillating anthology that shines a light on many unjustly overlooked writers, is of unique importance in terms of women’s history and the history of writing about nature.