Around the world there are over 100 human names that mean ‘The Sun’; perhaps the clearest evidence of us humans being inspired by, and acknowledging the significance of, a 4.5 billion-year-old yellow dwarf star, a nearly perfect ball of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core.

Its benevolence and its destructive capacity affect all aspects of our being, our cultures, our artworks, and take The Sun away and Polar Night makes us sad, detached, without energy, struggling to concentrate, struggling to stay awake. Give us too much of it and we cannot survive its power.

With music from Colin Williams

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Equinox

Rush

2001 A Space Odyssey

Richard Strauss ‘Sunrise’

Sun Studio

RKO Pictures

Isla Santa Catalina

Helios

U2

Kiribati

Hopi

New Mexico

Mexico FIFA 1986

Serotonin

The Road - Cormac McCarthy

Carrington Event

Svalbard

Carl Nielson

A high tide coming

Will eat the land

A tide no breakwaters can withstand.

Act 1 Scene 1 Peter Grimes, Op. 33 Benjamin Britten, libretto Montagu Slater

On a cold winter's day, we go down to a river that becomes the sea and, in an exploration of the complex human relations with the tide, we go with the ‘ebb and flow’, feel the currents, watch the high water mark and study what gets cast up. We are waiting to see what the tide brings and what it takes away; especially at this time in human history. 

With music from Colin Williams.

‘JUST AS THE TIDE WAS FLOWING’ BY JON BODEN. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST https://www.jonboden.com 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

River Alde 

Benjamin Britten 

Corhampton 

Svalbard 

Moby Duck

Wild Man of Orford 

Wadden Sea 

Just as the Tide was Flowing 

Isle of Iona 

Dunwich

Woodhenge 

Doggerland 

Cockles

Julius Caesar; William Shakespeare

Food can be about more than taste, it can be about the gathering and that when you ‘spend a lot of time in Nature you have another relationship with it’. In this episode we learn much, especially about the uses of Arctic plants, from a joyous conversation with Eva Gunnare, who has made her home in Jokkmokk, a place that is the heart of indigenous Sami culture in Sweden. 

Unlike may of us, the Sami have had a different connection to the land: they use it but do not own it and work together to make a living. Indigenous peoples can have deep-rooted traditions of using plants for medicine and food - a tradition where the difference between survival food and base food is knowledge, knowledge that can be lost but can also be kept alive.

Eva guides tours and gives ‘taste performances’ and you can find out more at her website. Eva's 'Rose' song: 

INTRODUCTORY MUSIC BY EVA GUNNARE. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST

All other music by Colin Williams

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Sámi  Jokkmokk  Stockholm  Kvikkjokk  Mountain Sorrel  Padjelanta National Park  Goahti turf hut  Alpine Bistort  Wild Angelica   Rowan  Birch  Rosebay Willowherb  Reindeer  Scots Pine  Cloudberry  Arctic Bramble  Bilberry  Bog Bilberry  Joik   Noiadi / Shaman  Nettles   Dandelion  Meadowsweet  Glögg 

“Only the mountain has lived long enough to listen objectively to the howl of a wolf”, Aldo Leopold. Prejudices, storytelling, popular culture and medieval demonisation populate the landscape we have created for the wolf; one that often bears little resemblance to the harsh and diverse landscapes they actually call home.

However, it is as a non-human creature that can seem all too human in its habits, that we humans seem to struggle the most. In this podcast we ponder the history of our relationship with wolves, the detail of how they live and where, the motifs we have created and how they live alongside us, and increasingly so. What is our future alongside wolves? What is the wolf’s future alongside us?

MUSIC BY COLIN WILLIAMS

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Yellowstone National Park Theodore Roosevelt Aldo Leopold David Mech Doug Smith Jim Halfpenny Dan Hartman Red Hot Chilli Peppers Rudyard Kipling Nunamiut Inupiat of Alaska Blackfoot Confederacy Pawnee Zuni Fenrir Lupa romana Little Red Riding Hood Aesop’s Fables Three Little Pigs Big Bad Wolf  Of Wolves and Men - Barry Lopez The Great American Wolf - Bruce Hampton The Grey - Liam Neeson Werewolves of London - Warren Zevon The Colour of Money Sasquatch An American Werewolf in London Rietschen  Trophic cascade E O Wilson Ed Bangs

“Long ago when animals could speak …”. In this episode we explore the boundary lines between non-human species and ourselves, boundary lines that many indigenous peoples - and our ancestors - did not see, and the ability, or not for communication to pass across that boundary. Today, for western society, it is only in children’s novels that animals can speak and be heard.

So much is invested by animals in the biology of communication and we can teach creatures about human communication but is it inconceivable that they have an ability to speak to us in their form? In maintaining scientific distance do we only allowed artists and musicians to show us that other species have ‘language’ and we should not treat the non-human as less than ourselves?

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

TOGETHER WITH ADDITIONAL MUSIC IN THIS EPISODE BY DAVID ROTHENBERG

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Sitting Bull https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sitting_Bull  Tales from Ovid - Ted Hughes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tales_from_Ovid  Chaser - border collie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaser_(dog)  Kanzi - bonobo https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kanzi  Raven https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raven Greater Honeyguide https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greater_honeyguide Red-tailed Hawk https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red-tailed_hawk  Watership Down https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watership_Down  The Jungle Book https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Jungle_Book  The Chronicles of Narnia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chronicles_of_Narnia  John Masefield https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Masefield Sperm Whale https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sperm_whale  Orca or Killer Whale https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killer_whale  Blue Whale https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_whale  Corky https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corky_(killer_whale)  David Rothenberg http://www.davidrothenberg.net Thousand Mile Song https://www.theguardian.com/books/2008/jun/07/scienceandnature Birds Why Birds Sing https://www.theguardian.com/books/2005/dec/10/featuresreviews.guardianreview5  Bug Music https://www.bugmusicbook.com  Eisteddfod https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eisteddfod  Jim Nollman https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Nollman  Dolphin Dreamtime http://www.doyletics.com/_arj1/dolphind.htm  Kamchatka https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kamchatka_Peninsula  Henry Beston https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henry_Beston  Tree networks https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/the-whispering-trees-180968084/  Plants and sound https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plant_bioacoustics  Himalayan Balsam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Impatiens_glandulifera  David Abram https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Abram Becoming Animal https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/318/becoming-animal-by-david-abram/  Prince Charles https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles,_Prince_of_Wales  Real Magic - Dean Radin https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/551604/real-magic-by-dean-radin-phd/  Day of the Triffids - John Wyndham https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_of_the_Triffids  Evelyn Glennie https://www.evelyn.co.uk  Monica Gagliano https://www.monicagagliano.com  Plant Consciousness https://www.plantconsciousness.com  Plant Intelligence and the Imaginal World - Stephen Harrod Buhner https://www.stephenharrodbuhner.com/about/  Kurukindi https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JZ77sYSqD6o 

The human and the non-human claim rivers as their own. By the banks of the River Kennet we conjour with our thoughts and experiences of rivers waters, along with those of a diverse cast of that includes: Roger Deakin, Bruce Springsteen, Norman Maclean, Masuru Emoto, Feargal Sharkey, Icy Sedgewick, Lewis Mumford, Michael Harner, Bedřich Smetana and Joseph Conrad.

We take in the travels, contours, myths, creatures, stories and spirits of rivers such as the: Awash, Tigris, Indus, Yellow, Nile, Danube, Amazon, Alde, Namada, Volga, Boyne, Crystal, Laxa, Congo, Moldau, Tana, and Everglades. We fight over them, deify them, we use them and misuse them, and yet what runs through them, because of us and despite us, is the the lifeblood of our world.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

The River Kennet https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/River_Kennet  Water Crowfoot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ranunculus_aquatilis  Water Vole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_water_vole Grass Snake https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grass_snake  Reed Bunting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_reed_bunting  Brown Trout https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brown_trout Brook Lamprey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brook_lamprey Crayfish https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austropotamobius_pallipes Mayfly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mayfly Caddisfly https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caddisfly Awash River https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Awash_River River Tigris https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tigris River Indus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indus_River Yellow River https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellow_River River Nile https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nile River Danube https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danube  River Amazon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_River River Alde https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/River_Alde  Emperor Claudius https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claudius  Boudicca https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boudica  Pied Kingfisher https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pied_kingfisher  Water Monitor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asian_water_monitor  Lewis Mumford https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lewis_Mumford  River Namada https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narmada_River  River Volga https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Volga_River  Isis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isis  River Boyne https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/River_Boyne  Kelpie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kelpie  Morgan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morgen_(mythological_creature)  Personhood for rivers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Environmental_personhood  Animism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Animism  Roger Deakin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Deakin  West Indian Manatee https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Indian_manatee  Crystal River https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crystal_River,_Florida  The Salmon of Knowledge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salmon_of_Knowledge  Laxa https://www.nat.is/laxa-river/  Kushtaka, Tlingit https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kushtaka  Selkie https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selkie  Amazon River Dolphin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amazon_river_dolphin  The Grindylow https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grindylow  Icy Sedgewick http://www.icysedgwick.com  Peg Powla https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peg_Powler  Hamish Henderson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamish_Henderson  Goðafoss https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goðafoss  Michael Harner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Harner  Mircia Eliade https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mircea_Eliade  Achuar https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Achuar  The Fighting Temeraire https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fighting_Temeraire  Heart of Darkness https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_of_Darkness  River Congo https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congo_River  Apocalypse Now https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apocalypse_Now  Bruce Springsteen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bruce_Springsteen  The River https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_River_(Bruce_Springsteen_album)  Bedřich Smetana https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bedřich_Smetana  River Moldau https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vltava  Baiji https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baiji  Masuru Emoto https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masaru_Emoto  Chlorpyrifos https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chlorpyrifos Chalk streams https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chalk_stream  Feargal Sharkey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feargal_Sharkey  River Tana https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tana_(Norway)  Everglades https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Everglades  Okavango https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Okavango_Delta  Daintree https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daintree_Rainforest  Cantabria https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantabria  Norman Maclean https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Maclean 

How do we each respond to the environmental alarms that are being sounded by climate, nature, youth and the ocean? In this episode we feature interviews with Roger Hardy and Rhett Griffiths - wave-tossed thoughts from the tideline of the North Sea - plus a recording of Rhett’s epic poem ‘The Tipping Tide’.

Artists suggest different ways of seeing the world and, in response to these issues and as part of Siren Festival in 2019, artist and sculptor Roger Hardy created a powerful installation and multiple figurative sculptural piece on Aldeburgh beach entitled ‘Time and Tide’. He also created ‘Lookout’, a human figure gazing out at the sea from the South Beach Lookout. Here was also installed - in written form and in audio recoding - ‘The Tipping Tide’, a poem by Rhett Griffiths.

With extracts of Colin singing ‘Adieu Sweet Lovely Nancy’, we explore what the sea says to us.

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Rhett Griffiths

poem - The Tipping Tide

Roger Hardy 

Siren Festival   Roger Hardy’s ‘Time and Tide’  Roger Hardy and Rhett Griffiths’ 'Lookout' and 'Tipping Tide'   Lancaster  Dawlish   Aldeburgh Festival  Suffolk  Devi Singh   Heathcote Williams   Benjamin Britten  South Beach Lookout   Greta Thunberg   School strikes   Mudlarking   Felixstowe 

An archetype, a creature that we impose human ideas, ideals, values and characteristics upon. An unknowable, untouchable creature of the dark, whose call provokes fear and awe. A silent, surreptitious, living breathing feathered predator, whose beyond-human abilities allow it to master the night and span almost every habitat on Earth. Which of these is Owl for you?

As a family of birds, owls are all of these and more, and we explore their role in human culture from 30,000 years ago to the present day, as well as sharing tales of owl encounters around the globe. Evil messenger and harbinger of Death? Wise councillor and friend from childhood literature? Owl can be what each of us bring to it but is also master of its world.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Forest Eagle Owl  Sinharaja, Sri Lanka  Pliny the Elder Tengmalm’s Owl Florence Nightingale Pablo Picasso Winnie the Pooh Bagpuss   Tawny Owl   Eric Hosking   Ural Owl   Sir David Attenborough   Hawk Owl   Saariselkä, Finland Little Owl   Chauvet Cave, France   Eurasian Scops Owl   Athena   Harry Potter   Western Screech Owl   Hopi   Sokoke Scops Owl, Kenya Aztec god of death   Cider with Rosie, Laurie Lee   Barn Owl   William Wordsworth   Tlingit   Egyptian Book of the Dead   Great Horned Owl Seminole Apache   The Secret Life of the Owl, John Lewis-Stempel   Great Grey Owl Barred Owl   Minnesota, USA   Eurasian Eagle Owl   Eurasian Pygmy Owl   Pel’s Fishing Owl   Blakiston’s Fish Owl   Snowy Owl Twin Peaks, David Lynch   The Messengers, Mike Clelland   Whitley Strieber   Owlman, Cornwall   The Mothman Prophecies, John Keel   Mark Twain   Elf Owl   Short-eared Owl Denmark   Öland, Sweden   Goldcrest “In a hole with an owl” The Fast Show  

“What avail are forty freedoms without a blank spot on the map?”, said writer Aldo Leopold, and in this episode we revisit what the human concept of wilderness means and where we might find it. Unmodified, unspoiled, on the edge? When in our history was the point when humans changed their view of wilderness?

With incidental music from Colin, we consider how wilderness means many differing things to different people - it is ‘home’ for some and hostile for others - and discuss what our view of it says about us. Is our definition derived from an International Union for the Conservation of Nature edict, or is it reflect - or even imposed - by the human approach to the way we make art? Ultimately, is wilderness still a valid notion or is it beyond our reach, beyond our gift to bestow, at a time when perhaps we need it more than ever?

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Jane Smith  Darren Rees  Kitty Jones Chris Wallbank Julian Hoffman Beauchene Island, Falklands Bay of Biscay, France & Spain Pasvik Valley, Norway Unst, Shetland Spitsbergen Hoo Peninsular, England Dan Richards IUCN wilderness definition 1B Xia Gui - master chinese painter   Old Testament Paleolithic art Sicily rock art caves   Shan shui - master chinese painter    Thomas Moran The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone (painting) The Sublime (artistic movement)   Sewell Newhouse (trap maker)   Industrial Revolution Snow Storm: Hannibal and his Army Crossing the Alps (painting by J. M. W. Turner) Smithsonian, Washington DC Aboriginal Australian art Shoshone Ansel Adams   BBC Planet Earth John Muir Bushcraft Aldo Leopold Annie Dillard Edward Abbey   Kvitøya Island, Svalbard Barry Lopez   Of Wolves and Men Jordan Bedouin All Things are Quite Silent (English folk song) Franklin Expedition  

The Sea ~ a prelude 

Summoning the spirit of a forthcoming full podcast on The Sea, we tease with Rhett Griffiths reading an extract from his poem ‘The Tipping Tide’ (more of the poem and an interview to come), Colin singing ‘Adieu Sweet Lovely Nancy’, plus wave-tossed thoughts recorded by the sea-washed shingle on the tideline of a grey North Sea.

All in rather lively STEREO by way of a change. Enjoy.

The way that people respond to wild places lights them up; so proposes writer Dan Richards, who’s latest acclaimed book, ‘Outpost: A Journey to the Wild Ends of the Earth’, explores what wilderness means to us. In this podcast he discusses whether our response to wilderness is bearing witness to the traces of humans who have been affected by places that, in our imagination, are meant to be savage and untameable.

Does wilderness comprise the places where a writer can touch ‘other’? Be lonely? Feel alive? Escape human connection? Or see what the world would be like without us? These places change us, and with music by Dan himself and prompting from Colin - solo in this episode - together they ponder ultimately whether humans are entitled to go to these places that might themselves be irrevocably changed by our visits? 

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Outpost: A Journey to the Wild Ends of the Earth 

Wealden Literary Festival 

Dan Richards 

Svalbard 

Ny Ålesund 

Polar Bear 

Climate change 

Desolation Peak 

Jack Kerouac 

On the Road 

Thoreau 

Walden 

Roald Dahl 

Francis Bacon 

Edward Abbey 

Gary Snyder  

Cairngorm Mountains 

Bothy 

Iceland sæluhús 

Mars Desert Research Station 

Cordouan Lighthouse 

Ray Bradbury 

The Foghorn 

The Signalman, Charles Dickens 

Roger Deakin 

Nicky Wire, Manic Street Preachers 

Oscar II Land 

From the North-west passage to Niels Bohr via Bruce Chatwin, Bardsey Island, Joan Baez and Blue Whales, our journey on this podcast explores the physicality, spirituality and ‘otherness’ of pilgrimage. Recorded on location on the Camino de Santiago in Asturias, northern Spain we ponder the meaning of this human act of endurance, faith and meditation.

What do we learn when we feel the earth on our skin and feel, and touch or reconnect to, something more: to meet the crossing points to our ancestors, or the migratory routes of birds, or profound non-human experiences. Accompany us and discover if we are in fact ‘nobody to the hills; just a body, feeling’.

With music by Colin Williams.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net  Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Asturias  Biodiverse  Camino de Santiago  Oviedo  Cathedral of San Salvador  Frédéric Gros: A Philosophy of Walking  Satish Kumar  Green lanes  Croagh, Ireland  Kumano Kodō, Japan  Kumano Shan Zan  Via Francigena, Italy  Pilgrims Way, North Wales  Holywell  Bardsey Island  Mount Kailash Circuit Tibet  Matthew Oates  Migration of birds  Santa Cristina de Lena  Swifts  Shamanism  John Clare  Brill Building, Broadway  Goffin & King  Elton John  Cafe Wah?, Greenwich Village  Ellis Island  Sicilian  Black Mountains, Wales  Bruce Chatwin  Niels Bohr  Quantum Physics  Paleolithic rock art  John Coltrane  Joan Baez  Bob Dylan   Blue Whale  Northwest Passage  John Franklin Michael Palin: Erebus  Stan Rodgers   Michael Meade: Fate and Destiny the Two Agreements of the Soul 

We live in the age of the 6th Mass Extinction; one that is human caused. Yet, amidst all this loss, we are still finding so called ‘Lazarus’ species; creatures that we believe we had extirpated but have been re-found. And some that have not been proven, but many fervently believe are still alive, clinging on to existence away from human gaze and knowledge; ready for a second coming.

Why are we so reluctant to let go of that which has demonstrably gone? Why do we hold a desperate desire that some creatures are still there, but we didn’t care enough at the time to stop their eradication? In this episode we explore stories of the Tasmanian Tiger, the Ivory-billed Woodpecker and others, and wonder why do so many of us ache for natural loss not to be final.

With music from Colin Williams

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Ivory-billed Woodpecker

Thylacine

Arthur Conan Doyle

Cottingley Faeries

Sixth Mass Extinction

Yangtze River Dolphin

Passenger Pigeon

Honshu Wolf

Mexican Grizzly Bear

Tasmanian Emu

Tasman Starling

Coelacanth

New Zealand Storm Petrel

Mahogany Glider

Mountain Pygmy Possum

Adelaide Pygmy Blue-tongued Skink

Bridled Nail-tailed Wallaby

Night Parrot

Aldo Leopold’s ‘Sand County Almanac’ 

Darren Rees

Ghosts of Gone Birds

BirdLife International

Carolina Parakeet

John James Audubon

Galapagos 

Lonesome George

Natural History Museum, Tring

Sam Keen

Recorded on Hampstead Heath in London, we take a journey into some of the most threatened places and habitats of the non-human world by talking with Julian Hoffman, author of the newly published and acclaimed book ‘Irreplaceable’. He eloquently weaves accounts of both loss and ‘radical hopefulness’ through the stories of the people working to save these places, and through our conversation we seek to answer questions about our relationship with the non-human.

Are stories becoming ever more important for us to navigate the great challenging environmental issues of our time? Why do locations become places of importance to humans? Why do some enlarge what ‘home’ means to them by including the non-human? How do we resist being divorced from the natural world by the those pursuing power and greed? How is it that children still engage with the non-human in the little details and small places unselfconscious about engaging with nature?

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Irreplaceable

Julian Hoffman

Hoo Peninsular

John Keats 

Mavrovo National Park - north Macedonia

Meteora monastery west Greece

Watford allotments

Wales

Gwent Levels

Wordsworth

Future Generations Act

Cairngorms

Jim Harrison

Václav Cílek

Serengeti

Great Expectations

David Abram

Nan Shepherd

Arctic Tern

Bangka island, Indonesia

There is perhaps no creature that better encapsulates our conflicted relationship with the non-human world. Think of the complex mix of ideas that we humans associate with bears in modern times: child’s toy; indigenous people’s power totem; the reality of human-bear antagonism; the fear of unpredictable predators; celestial constellation; Boston Bruins; Chicago Bears; Yogi; Goldilocks; the list goes on. Through their place for us in myth, symbolism, history and reality do bears ‘see’ through us, and in doing so allow us to see beyond our humanity and glimpse again how we are primordially connected to the natural world?

With music from Colin, and recordings from in the field in Asturias, northern Spain, amidst the mountains, screes, meadows and forests of biologically-rich Somiedo Natural Park, we explore the ideas that humans hold regarding Bear, whilst seeking an encounter for real with a being that is now scarce in western Europe. With special thanks to Marco and Wild Watching Spain.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Somiedo Natural Park

Asturias Cantabrian Brown Bear

Grizzly Man movie

Grenadier Guards bearskins

Bear clan

Eight species of bear

Kodiak Bear

Romania Bears

Nicolae Ceausescu

Bears in Britain

Cave Bear Grizzly Bear

Winnie the Pooh

Gentle Ben

Bear senses

Bear Totem

Spirituality and Bear

Nature, the non-human - and humans too - connect together in the world of sounds. We are all auditory creatures. However, how do we non-humans relate to what we hear? How do we experience these sounds and where do we store the images and memories we associate with them: in our heads, our hearts, our cells, or all of those?

With three chosen non-human sounds that mean something to him and spark discussion, plus his own music, Colin considers: the messages that the non-human shares with us; the difference between noise and sound; seeking being unsettled by a natural sound; how sounds herald other beings as visitors in ‘our’ world; and how we feel their presence. 

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Whale blowing 

Blue Whale 

Science of sounds as a sight 

Cockchafer / May Bug 

Emotional Reaction Model - Misophonia 

Echoic memory 

Dylan Thomas 

Love in the Asylum Richard Adams Watership Down 

Skylark 

Vaughan Williams 

The Lark Ascending Thomas Moore 

Philip Hoare 

Cape Cod

Melissa Harrison 

Rain 

Hinduism 

River Ganges 

Mary Oliver 

At the River Clarion 

Night distorts the human world and, as we become separated from what is not human, is the night the way we reconnect with that experience? Sat in a final fragment of Dunwich’s 10th century Greyfriars Monastery, near a single tombstone of All Saints Churchyard, we record this podcast at night in one of the “most haunted places in England”.

With ‘A Natural History of Ghosts’ by Roger Clarke, filling our minds, we contemplate why should ghosts - whatever that phenomena might be - appear more often at night? As night ‘falls’ (or does it rise?) we consider the fears that we lay at night’s door, seen from the corner of one’s eye. A time of danger and the ‘other’, night is filled with terrors for modern humans.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Greyfriars Priory 

Dunwich 

Brassaï 

Tarsier 

M R James 

Margaret Atwood 

Black Shuck 

Hobby Lanterns 

Marsh Gas 

Homer’s Odyssey 

Apochrypa 

Jinn 

A Natural History of Ghosts - Roger Clarke 

Bram Stoker  

“To enter a wood is to pass into a different world” said author Roger Deakin, and in this episode, recorded in ancient Staverton Thicks forest, we explore why it is that there is a history of humans going to the woods to grow and learn, and to travel to find ourselves, often by getting lost. Why is it a place of story-telling, of fairy tales, of childhood imagination?

Disorientating for many modern humans, is there a density of ‘otherness’ in forest, and is this why for us the wild wood is it place of fear but also a place that we love? Sit with us on a mossy fallen tree as we question whether these are places to hide, to escape and adventure, or ones to fear where the non-human - or perhaps human - is watching us.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Blair Witch Project 

Staverton Thicks 

Pollarding 

Gossip from the Forest - Sara Maitland 

Where the Wild Things Are - Maurice Sendak 

Grimm’s Fairy Tales 

As You Like It - William Shakespeare 

Walden - Henry David Thoreau 

Wood - Andy Goldsworthy

The Scarlet Letter - Nathaniel Hawthorn 

The Consolations of the Forest - Sylvain Tesson 

Wild Wood - Roger Deakin 

Woodlands - Oliver Rackham 

Lord of the Rings 

Domesday Book 

Beowulf 

Białowieża 

Baka people 

The Witch - Robert Eggers 

Grizzly Adams 

Olympic National Park 

Massachusetts

Polish Jewish villages 

We humans have long made sense of the non-human world around, and beyond us, through storytelling and myth. Folklore has much to say about hairy wild men, and women, and their relationship to us, past and present. Exploring these motifs, stories and the creative process, we focus on these ‘woodwose’, their presence on church fonts, and their probable origins as creatures and symbols. 

We speak with playwright Thea Smiley who, with theatre company Wonderful Beast, has written about The Last Wildman and The Woodwose. With her we ponder what we should learn from wild places and wild people, and the 'mythical' beings who perhaps know more than we do about how to live.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Aesops Fables 

Pliny  

Michael Witzel

Selkie

Flood mythology 

Werewolf 

Wendigo 

Griffin 

Thea Smiley

Wonderful Beast theatre company 

Return of the Wildman 

Woodwose 

Woodwose photos 

Matt Salusbury 

The Wildman 

Wildman of Orford 

Ludham font 

Ralph of Coggeshall 

Green children of Woolpit 

Orford Ness 

Ted Hughes ‘Wodwo’ 

Bigfoot, Sasquatch, Almasty 

In this podcast we explore the proscribed routes, the safe paths, the trackways; and how they affect our perception of the land and our experience of the non-human world. What lives beyond the path? Are we an animal making paths of convenience or is there a human need for paths, boundaries and way markers - is it that our species deliberately wants to make marks on the land?

On a windswept autumn day we explore The Ridgeway and ancient Wayland’s Smithy discussing trading routes, pilgrimage, and how to avoid getting lost on tracks that may even be born of the Earth itself.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

The Ridgeway

Oxfordshire Downs  Wayland’s Smithy  Uffington White Horse 

Plague village of Eyam  The Old Straight Track  Ley lines   Paths of Desire  The Old Ways   Robert MacFarlane  A Line Made by Walking  National Trust   Tristan Gooley 

Night makes us focus on our human experience of the darkness. Night is a place where the non-human world thrives: both in reality through wild predators whose senses exceed ours, and also in imagination as, for humans, the darkness often harbours our fears and is home to the unknown, the half-seen, and the mis-heard.

We explore what is special about night, In what ways does night reveal itself that goes beyond simply the interval between the light of day? How do we respond as the night-time takes away our senses? Maybe night is when we see ourselves most clearly.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Robert Johnson 

Canonical hours 

Ramadan 

Melatonin 

The Daintree 

Tawny Owl 

Nightjar 

Transylvania 

Fortified churches  

Svalbard  

Spring-heeled Jack 

Jack the Ripper 

Reynardine 

Heart electromagnetic field 

Baja California

Swamp gas 

Human sleep pattern 

Botswana 

The Darkness is Light Enough 

Visions of Johanna  

In a windswept locale we explore how both we, and the inhabitants the non-human world, respond to the wind. Wind spirits, the voice of the wind, hurricanes, and the sense of ‘aliveness’ that it has all affect us. Why does it makes us feel a certain way? How is it perceived by many indigenous human cultures?

For birds, insects, trees, seeds, oceans and more, the way the wind moves across The Earth is fundamental to their lives. And so it is to us. Indeed during this podcast you can catch the wind in our voices.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

North Wessex Downs 

The effect of wind on children 

Inkpen Beacon  

Anemochory 

Mi’kmaq

Navajo word for wind 

Sami god, Bieggolmai  

Carlos Castaneda  

Shetland  

Iceland 

Western Isles

Beaufort scale 

Aeolian harp 

Gerard Manley Hopkins 

We explore some of the most evocative sounds in the natural world and examine the power that the acoustics of the non-human world have over us. As we listen in Part 1 to Ian’s choice of sounds, we discuss how we navigate the natural world with sound and how it gives us a sense of place.

Are we acoustic creatures? What is the ‘voice’ of the non-human world? How does it speak?

How does sound link to a sense of place and calendar and what is it power to stir memories in us? What indeed is its power for one species to ‘speak’ to another?

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

David Abram, Becoming Animal 

Spring Peeper 

Barry Lopez, Arctic Dreams

Elk 

Chris Watson  

Geoff Sample  

Gruenrekorder 

Peregrine Falcon 

Of all the ways we relate to the natural world it could be said that the human sense of smell is by turns our most powerful sense and yet also our weakest link with the rest of Nature. Scents can transport us, can help us form enduring memories, proves the link between our olfactory system and our limbic system.

The human nose and brain can detect 1 trillion different odours yet we have inadequate language to describe them, often amalgamate them into collective smells (“it smells like a forest”) and struggle to quieten our mind in Nature and become one with the odours. With contributions from Ella Roberts, Sam Lee, Devi Singh and Gina Gow, we attempt to make sense of scents.

Music from Colin Williams

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Jasmine  Tom Robbins  Sam Lee Nature Moroccan souk Herb Robert   Peak District Patrick Süskind   Freshwater Mint Meadowsweet   Adam Thorpe Wiltshire Downs   Hiraeth   Cistus Wild Thyme   Cairngorms   Cuban cigar   Fern Schumer Chapman   Balsam Poplar   Tamarack Song   Aldo Leopold   Red Fox Henry Beston   Sagebrush Yellowstone   Western Meadowlark   White Sage   Bay of Fundy Bougainvillaea   Fungi Amanita Neroli Rosemary 

The non-human world, in it’s many guises, can often be a place where we face our fears. Recorded in Cambridge at Mill Road Cemetery and the 12th century Leper Chapel of St Mary Magdalene, this episode features an interview with Robert Lloyd Parry, an outstanding performance storyteller, who specialises in classic literary ghost fiction, in particular the work of Montague Rhodes James.

We explore Fear: as a human adaptation; as a heightened sense; as a part of our experience in the wild; as something ‘unnatural’; or something we experience in solitude; and how we experience it in our sense of familiar and unfamiliar places. 

We would like to thank our wonderful guest Robert Lloyd Parry. To discover more about him visit  http://www.nunkie.co.uk

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Arthur Machen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Machen

The Cruel Mother https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cruel_Mother

Malcolm Sinclair https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_Sinclair_(actor)

Julian Hoffman https://julian-hoffman.com/irreplaceable/

Ray Bradbury https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Bradbury

Kenneth Grahame https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenneth_Grahame

Robert Macfarlane https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Macfarlane_(writer) 

M R James https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._R._James

A Warning to the Curious https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Warning_to_the_Curious 

Oh Whistle and I’ll Come to You My Lad https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%27Oh,_Whistle,_and_I%27ll_Come_to_You,_My_Lad%27

Cambridge Leper Chapel https://www.cambridgeppf.org/Pages/Category/cambridge-leper-chapel

Canon Alberic’s Scrapbook https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canon_Alberic%27s_Scrap-Book

The qualities of light, and how the natural, human and non-human world can be viewed and impacted by light is under discussion in this episode of the podcast. References you might wish to follow up include:

Watership Down, Hampshire, UK https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watership_Down,_Hampshire

John Aitchison, cameramen and broadcaster http://johnaitchison.net

The Native American medicine wheel https://www.nlm.nih.gov/nativevoices/exhibition/healing-ways/medicine-ways/medicine-wheel.html

Songlines by Bruce Chatwin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Songlines

Ladysmith Black Mambazo https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladysmith_Black_Mambazo

Baja California, Mexico https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baja_California

Extremadura, Spain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremadura

The Society of Wildlife Artists (SWLA) http://swla.co.uk

Darren Rees, artist http://www.darrenrees.com

Lars Jonsson, artist http://www.larsjonsson.se

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lars_Jonsson_(illustrator)

Barry Lopez, writer http://www.barrylopez.com

What is it about fire that draws us to its side? It brings warmth and safety, yet it carries a destructive threat. Recorded on location by the fireside in Suffolk, this episode explores our long relationship with fire and how it links us to our landscapes. We talk about how it has bound us in belief, and its role at the centre of communities and belief systems. 

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST. 

Some of things we discuss in this episode

Beltane https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beltane

Native American sweat lodge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweat_lodge

Polly Wiessner https://www.humansandnature.org/polly-wiessner 

The Biggest Estate on Earth by Bill Gammage https://www.allenandunwin.com/browse/books/general-books/history/The-Biggest-Estate-on-Earth-Bill-Gammage-9781743311325

Yellowstone https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yellowstone_National_Park

Great Fire of London https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Fire_of_London

Must Farm http://www.mustfarm.com/

Phoenix https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phoenix_(mythology)

Salamander https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salamander

Pyromancy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyromancy

Recorded on location in Asturias, Cantabria and Castilla y Leon in northern Spain: join us, Colin Williams and Ian Rowlands, as we look at how our ancestors approached death, life and spirit, through our exploration of ancient sites and the manner in which they are located in the landscape.

These sites provoked some lasting emotions and questions in us: our place in time and bones of the land; what is the import of posterity; our relationship with our far-distant ancestors; their relationship to the creatures they shared their world with; and their relationship to the rituals, spirits and places that were of such importance to them.

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Asturias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asturias

Cantabria https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantabria 

Castilla y Leon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castile_and_León

Dolmen de Busnela https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolmen_de_Busnela 

Dolmen de Las Arnillas http://www.turismoburgos.org/es/destino/cultural/dolmen-de-las-arnillas 

The sacred hoop http://nativeamerican.proboards.com/thread/450/sacred-hoop-circle-life 

R S Thomas https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/r-s-thomas 

Hornos de la Peña http://cuevas.culturadecantabria.com/hornos-de-la-pena-2/ 

El Castillo http://cuevas.culturadecantabria.com/el-castillo-2/ 

Bullroarer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullroarer 

Graham Hancock https://grahamhancock.com 

The Divine Spark https://grahamhancock.com/divinespark/ 

The Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mind_in_the_Cave 

Jean Clottes https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Clottes 

What is Paleolithic Art? https://www.bradshawfoundation.com/books/what_is_paleolithic_art_jean_clottes.php

The power and diversity of ritual and ceremony: join us, Colin Williams and Ian Rowlands, as we look at how the cycles of the natural, human and non-human world can be viewed and recognised through ritual. Why do humans create rituals? How do they relate to our experience of a world of ‘other’?  

THEME MUSIC BY DAVID ROTHENBERG. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST http://www.davidrothenberg.net 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Carpathian Mountains https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carpathian_Mountains

Walbiri rain ceremony https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSyp65n9AZk

Gamilaraay people https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamilaraay

Watership Down, Hampshire, UK https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watership_Down,_Hampshire

Falmouth Harmony Choir https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idN5ZBXDllk

Papua New Guinea spirit house http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/archived/creativeinstinct/sepik-spirit-art/4404386

Wagogo Marriage Ritual https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8t1TcTzeF7A

Silurian Morrismen http://www.silurianmorris.org.uk

Oak Apple Day https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oak_Apple_Day

Crying the Neck https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crying_the_Neck

Soul Caking https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul_cake

On Silbury Hill, by Adam Thorpe https://www.littletoller.co.uk/shop/books/little-toller/on-silbury-hill/

Folk Song in England, A L Lloyd https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A._L._Lloyd

Navajo corn grinding songs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zR7Z4vGIHbs

Sky burial https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sky_burial

Dolmen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dolmen

Is song connected to even deeper roots than time and place? Can music and song can bring us closer to the non-human world? Does musical meaning arise from the experience of inhabiting the world and is it shared freely between humans and birds and trees and ‘all our relations’? 

We explore all this and much more with the wonderful Sam Lee. A highly inventive and original singer, folk song interpreter, passionate conservationist, song collector and successful creator of live events. Alongside his organisation, The Nest Collective, Sam has shaken up the music scene breaking boundaries between folk and contemporary music and the assumed places and ways folksong is appreciated.

And he is the author of the acclaimed ‘The Nightingale’, a book about a bird whose presence and reassurance of nature represents an English totemism, a symbol of a visceral relationship with the natural world, myth and identity. Mixing grief, hope and vision for the future, we explore how Nature projects on to us, not us on to Nature.

Sam Lee website  

The Nightingale book 

Old Wow album 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Jeannie Robertson - MacCrimmons Lament  Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan  Bernard Butler  Buzzard  Totem   Anthropomorphism   Heron   Kestrel Ornithology   Totem Pole Ray Mears  Shamanism Music Declares Emergency   Wembley Stadium   Hans Christian Andersen   J M W Turner   Hawthorn Supermoon   Ecology Solastalgia   Caroline Lucas MP   Benedict MacDonald - Rebirding Monsanto   Siren Calling   Fridays for Future 

An archetype, a creature that we impose human ideas, ideals, values and characteristics upon? A real, spectral being, visiting us from the demonic world? Or simply our domestic companion for thousands of years that we have venerated, commemorated and depicted in myriad ways? Hounds have been - and continue to be - all of these for us humans.

As a denizen of the wild around them, humans have encountered wolves, jackals and dogs dependent upon geography, and those cultures have found ways to bring those relationships into myth, legend, worship, movies and more. In this episode we ponder Anubis in Egypt and the Beast of Bray Road, Robert Johnson’s ‘Hellhound on My Trail’ and the legend of East Anglia’s ‘Black Shuck’.

THEME MUSIC BY COLIN WILLIAMS

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Holy Trinity Church, Blythburgh Black Shuck East Anglia The Hound of the Baskervilles Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban  Flag Fen Caldicot Shamanism Saint Christopher New Testament Bog bodies River Styx Spanish Water Dog Anubis Sirius Tutankhamun  Werewolf Dogman Encounters Radio Beast of Bray Road Jung Archetypes Jackal Osiris Sumarian Goddess Bau The Omen Lycanthrope Beowulf Grendel Scucca Hellhound on My Trail Robert Johnson Delta Blues Gospel music Caerwent Staines Leiston Abbey Felixstowe Gorleston Long Island Ipswich

The power of place, our fascination with what is not human . . . these have been cornerstones of Beneath the Stream since we began. But so too is the power of the human mind, our perceptions, our telling of stories and perhaps, most of all, the telling of stories to ourselves through culture and memory and the tricks and truths we encounter.

The work of author Ed Parnell is a powerful illustration of all of the above. His acclaimed book Ghostland has been described as “Parnell’s moving exploration of what has haunted our writers and artists – and what is haunting him. It is a unique and elegiac meditation on grief, memory and longing, and of the redemptive power of stories and nature.” Ghostland was shortlisted for the PEN Ackerley 2020 Award for memoir.

Speaking in the book of his memories he says, “All of it was real, I think”.

Ed Parnell’s website https://edwardparnell.com 

INTRODUCTORY AND INCIDENTAL MUSIC: Colin Williams singing ‘Breaths’ by Sweet Honey in the Rock

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

M R James https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M._R._James  Algernon Blackwood https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algernon_Blackwood  Stonehenge https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stonehenge  Garth Marenghi's Darkplace https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garth_Marenghi%27s_Darkplace  Boston, Lincs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boston,_Lincolnshire  Holbeach Marsh https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holbeach_Marsh  New York - Lou Reed https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_(album)  Fata Morgana https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fata_Morgana_(mirage)  Pilgrim Hospital https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pilgrim_Hospital  Illustrated London News https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Illustrated_London_News  The Willows https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Willows_(story)  The Danube https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danube  Lakenheath Fen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lakenheath_Fen_RSPB_reserve  Golden Oriole https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurasian_golden_oriole  Arthur Machen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Machen  Alan Garner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Garner  Weirdstone of Brisingamen https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Weirdstone_of_Brisingamen  The Moon of Gomrath https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Moon_of_Gomrath  Hemmingford Grey https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemingford_Grey  Robert Lloyd-Parry http://www.nunkie.co.uk  Waterland, Graham Swift https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterland_(novel)  The Wash https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wash  Jodrell Bank https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jodrell_Bank_Observatory  E F Benson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E._F._Benson  Borth https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borth  William Hope Hodgson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Hope_Hodgson  Folk Horror https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folk_horror  The House on the Borderland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_House_on_the_Borderland  The Blood on Satan’s Claw https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blood_on_Satan%27s_Claw  The Wicker Man https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wicker_Man  Witchfinder General https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witchfinder_General_(film)  Psychogeography https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychogeography  The Blair Witch Project https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blair_Witch_Project  Lapwing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_lapwing  Bella Lugosi https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bela_Lugosi  An American Werewolf in London https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_American_Werewolf_in_London  Tolkien https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J._R._R._Tolkien  Harry Potter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harry_Potter  The X-files https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_X-Files  Oh, Whistle, and I’ll Come to You, My Lad https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%27Oh,_Whistle,_and_I%27ll_Come_to_You,_My_Lad%27  Watership Down https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watership_Down 

“There are many songs in the landscape”, says Ed O’Brien, guitarist and member of Radiohead, “it roots you in what it means to be a human being; what are we doing walking on this planet”. In this podcast it’s our delight to have time with Ed as he describes the making of his solo album ‘Earth’ in retreat in mid-Wales, amidst a timeless, rich vein of Celtic tradition, and in Brazil amidst the polyrhythms of insects that are at the heart of samba.

Landscape, belief, aliveness, quantum physics, spirituality, and reading poetry aloud in the mountains, the interview dances through concepts, connections and contrasts, from a man who continues to be creating contemporary music that is a record of time, place, resonance and emotions. “Nature and landscape are not always easy places to be but you couldn’t feel more alive”.

Ed O’Brien and ‘Earth’ https://www.eobmusic.com 

INTRODUCTORY AND INCIDENTAL MUSIC: Colin Williams 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Led Zeppelin  Bon Iver  Jack Kerouac   Snowdonia Radiohead  Brazil  Oxfordshire  Vale of the White Horse  Mid-Wales  Cambrian Mountains  Jay Griffiths - Wild  Rhayader  River Wye   Walt Whitman - Leaves of Grass   William Blake  Dylan Thomas  Celtic Nations  The Shard  Plynlimon  Rebecca Solnit - Wanderlust  Barry Lopez  Aberystwyth   Ezra Pound   Dead Poets Society  Atheism   Agnosticism   Buddhism  Aldous Huxley - The Perennial Philosophy   Sufism   Kabbalah   Hinduism   Samba   Laura Marling   Nick Drake   New Mexico   Arizona   Dehli   Rajasthan   Bhutan   Sámi   Aretha Franklin   Quantum physics   Paul McCartney 

Gillian Burke is a biologist, TV presenter, public speaker, voiceover artist, writer and mother, and she joins us to discuss how people can relate to, and tell stories of, the human and non-human world. At a critical time for our environment scientists and artists can tell stories, especially when every single person and every single organism has a story to tell, about staying alive.

With her African, Asian, European, Native American, Oriental and Polynesian ancestry she uses different perspectives is to push past boundaries and discover greater empathy and connection with each other and the world we live in. A passion for science and storytelling reside in the universal themes of defeat and victory, endurance and resilience, the light and shade of being alive.

Gillian Burke’s website http://www.gillianburkevoice.com

INTRODUCTORY AND INCIDENTAL MUSIC: Colin Williams 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Kenya  Nairobi   University of Bristol   Blow Flies   Power lifting Cool Earth   Professor Wangari Maathai   Green Belt Movement Kenya   Survival International First Nations   Celtic   Cornwall   Beltane   Stonehenge   Matt Chatfield, The Cornwall Project Medieval   Druids 

Entering wild water we have the chance to become one with the river, the kingfisher, the sea, the seal. Or instead the visceral thrill of breaking the surface ice can leave us, in Karen’s words, “screamy flappy and trying to quieten the survival part of your brain”. It all depends it seems on what intention you set out with - a personal wild experience with no safety forms to complete.

With Karen of the glorious Swim Wild podcast as our guide, we explore how everyone comes to wild swimming for different reasons. How magical places and times of day are enhanced simply by being held by the water. As she says, each wild swim is unique and once it trickles through your fingers it’s gone, you can’t hold it, and there its no other recourse than to plan your next one.

Swim Wild podcast ~ the podcast for the wild swimming community. Interviewing members of your tribe about iconic swims, personal challenges, the friends they have made, the impact on their health and well being and finding a deeper connection with the natural world. Testing out the theory that, whenever and wherever we swim outside, we "emerge from the water better versions of ourselves".

INTRODUCTORY MUSIC EXPLORING THE BLUE BY LUKA BLOOM. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. USED BY KIND PERMISSION OF THE ARTIST

Luka Bloom https://www.lukabloom.com 

Some of the ideas and references we make in this podcast can be found here:

Lake District, Cumbria UK Great North Swim  Gilly McArthur  Jini Reddy, Wanderland  WhaleFest  Sunderland  Terns  Kingfisher