Listen and read

Step into an infinite world of stories

  • Listen and read as much as you want
  • Over 400 000+ titles
  • Bestsellers in 10+ Indian languages
  • Exclusive titles + Storytel Originals
  • Easy to cancel anytime
Subscribe now
Details page - Device banner - 894x1036

Pastoral Song

20 Ratings

4.8

Duration
8H 35min
Language
English
Format
Category

Non-Fiction

The acclaimed chronicle of the regeneration of one family's traditional English farm

NATIONAL BESTSELLER * Winner of the Wainwright Prize for Nature Writing * Named ""Nature Book of the Year"" by the Sunday Times * New York Times Editors' Choice * Shortlisted for the Orwell Prize and the Royal Society of Literature's Ondaatje Prize * A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: Sunday Times, Financial Times, New Statesman, Independent, Telegraph, Observer, and Daily Mail

""Superbly written and deeply insightful, the book captivates the reader until the journey’s end.” — Wall Street Journal

The New York Times bestselling author of The Shepherd’s Life profiles his family’s farm across three generations, revealing through this intimate lens the profound global transformation of agriculture and of the human relationship to the land.

As a boy, James Rebanks's grandfather taught him to work the land the old way. Their family farm in England's Lake District hills was part of an ancient agricultural landscape: a patchwork of crops and meadows, of pastures grazed with livestock, and hedgerows teeming with wildlife. And yet, by the time James inherited the farm, it was barely recognizable. The men and women had vanished from the fields; the old stone barns had crumbled; the skies had emptied of birds and their wind-blown song.

Hailed as ""a brilliant, beautiful book"" by the Sunday Times (London), Pastoral Song (published in the United Kingdom under the title English Pastoral) is the story of an inheritance: one that affects us all. It tells of how rural landscapes around the world were brought close to collapse, and the age-old rhythms of work, weather, community and wild things were lost. And yet this elegy from the northern fells is also a song of hope: of how, guided by the past, one farmer began to salvage a tiny corner of England that was now his, doing his best to restore the life that had vanished and to leave a legacy for the future.

This is a book about what it means to have love and pride in a place, and how, against all the odds, it may still be possible to build a new pastoral: not a utopia, but somewhere decent for us all.

[Published in the United Kingdom as English Pastoral.]

© 2021 HarperAudio (Audiobook): 9780063073265

Release date

Audiobook: 3 August 2021

Others also enjoyed ...

  1. Braiding Sweetgrass: Indigenous Wisdom, Scientific Knowledge and the Teachings of Plants Robin Wall Kimmerer
  2. Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine Gail Honeyman
  3. The Place of Tides James Rebanks
  4. Wilding: The Return of Nature to a British Farm Isabella Tree
  5. Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are? Frans de Waal
  6. Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind Yuval Noah Harari
  7. Gathering Moss: A Natural and Cultural History of Mosses Robin Wall Kimmerer
  8. Sorrow and Bliss: A Novel Meg Mason
  9. Rewilding: The Radical New Science of Ecological Recovery Cain Blythe
  10. Say Nothing: A True Story Of Murder and Memory In Northern Ireland Patrick Radden Keefe
  11. Silent Earth: Averting the Insect Apocalypse Dave Goulson
  12. Nothing to See Here Kevin Wilson
  13. Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow Yuval Noah Harari
  14. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life Mark Manson
  15. Rewild Yourself: 23 Spellbinding Ways to Make Nature More Visible Simon Barnes
  16. The Peregrine J. A. Baker
  17. Just Kids Patti Smith
  18. Blue Nights Joan Didion
  19. I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us and a Grander View of Life Ed Yong
  20. Islands of Abandonment: Life in the Post-Human Landscape Cal Flyn
  21. The Bookshop on the Corner: A Novel Jenny Colgan
  22. The Way Home: Tales from a Life without Technology Mark Boyle
  23. The Song of Achilles: A Novel Madeline Miller
  24. The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois Honorée Fanonne Jeffers
  25. Free Will Sam Harris
  26. Life on Earth David Attenborough
  27. Crying in H Mart: The Number One New York Times Bestseller Michelle Zauner
  28. Norse Mythology Neil Gaiman
  29. Brave New World Aldous Huxley
  30. Half of a Yellow Sun Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
  31. The Night Watchman Louise Erdrich
  32. The Origins of Totalitarianism Hannah Arendt
  33. We Should All Be Feminists Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
  34. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn Betty Smith
  35. Hell Bay: The Isles of Scilly Mysteries Kate Rhodes
  36. Astrophysics for People in a Hurry Neil deGrasse Tyson
  37. All The Light We Cannot See Anthony Doerr
  38. A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century Barbara W. Tuchman