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Landmarks

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About this listen

Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Landmarks by Robert Macfarlane, read by Roy McMillan

SHORTLISTED FOR THE SAMUEL JOHNSON PRIZE

SHORTLISTED FOR THE WAINWRIGHT PRIZE

From the bestselling author of UNDERLAND, THE OLD WAYS and THE LOST WORDS

'Few books give such a sense of enchantment; it is a book to give to many, and to return to repeatedly' Independent

'Enormously pleasurable, deeply moving. A bid to save our rich hoard of landscape language, and a blow struck for the power of a deep creative relationship to place' Financial Times

'A book that ought to be read by policymakers, educators, armchair environmentalists and active conservationists the world over' Guardian

'Gorgeous, thoughtful and lyrical' Independent on Sunday

'Feels as if [it] somehow grew out of the land itself. A delight' Sunday Times

Discover Robert Macfarlane's joyous meditation on words, landscape and the relationship between the two.

Words are grained into our landscapes, and landscapes are grained into our words. Landmarks is about the power of language to shape our sense of place. It is a field guide to the literature of nature, and a glossary containing thousands of remarkable words used in England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales to describe land, nature and weather.

Travelling from Cumbria to the Cairngorms, and exploring the landscapes of Roger Deakin, J. A. Baker, Nan Shepherd and others, Robert Macfarlane shows that language, well used, is a keen way of knowing landscape, and a vital means of coming to love it.

 Earth Sciences Nature & Ecology Outdoors & Nature Science Travel Writing & Commentary England

Critic reviews

A magnificent meditation on walking and writing. An astonishingly haunted book (Adam Nicolson (on The Old Ways))
The Old Ways sets the imagination tingling . . . it is like reading a prose Odyssey sprinkled with imagist poems (John Carey (on The Old Ways))
A wonderful book - literally a book full of wonders. He has a poet's eye and a prose style that will make many a novelist burn with envy (John Banville (on The Old Ways))
All stars
Most relevant
The idea of this book is very attractive, to collect and collate the various terms that define our understanding of the old/current world around us through the peculiarities of language passed down in near history.

I was very happy with this and very interested - although not entirely satisfied in the way in which the promise was delivered through. The ‘falling short’ for me was that the individual characters who were used to deliver the message - a Lancastrian musician being one example - seemed to lack depth of characterisation and, where offered, their link with the land seemed at times tenuous. This, of course, from me as anything but a son of the land - albeit, a Welsh and Irish heritage does give one a sense of entitlement when it comes to the wide-open spaces in the world of nature-spirituality.

What was enlightening, was the worrying news that so many common-place words now have no place (and are they so common?) with the youngest literate generation that we currently have in our care. If nothing else, the stir that this caused me was justification enough to read this work - but, to be fair there were lots of small pleasures along the route (Tyneside to South Shields, south along the river on a daily commute as it happens).

Routed in the land...flies in the mind.

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I have listened to this book on many occasions and love it. It celebrates writers who are in touch with specific aspects of the landscape or its wildlife - Cairngorm mountains, open water, peregrine Falcons etc. The writing is lyrical and it is beautifully read by Roy McMillan whose command of Gaelic names and words is stunning. My only reservation as an audio book is the many pages of glossary. It works for me as I listen in bed and regard this as a kind of soporific chant, although sometimes I get frustrated that by the time I hear a definition and realise I'm interested I have forgotten the word! I guess the answer is to buy it for kindle as well.

A wonderful book

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Would you consider the audio edition of Landmarks to be better than the print version?

Roy McMillan's voice is certainly a reason to choose the audio version.

What other book might you compare Landmarks to, and why?

The Old Ways also by Robert Macfarlane and read by Roy McMillan.

What about Roy McMillan’s performance did you like?

Brilliant!

Did you have an emotional reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?

Laugh and cry out loud!

Any additional comments?

Because of this book I have now read other books that were superb. J A Bakers The Peregrine will now be one of my favourite books ever... it would be a brilliant audio book but I'd have to think hard about who could be the voice.

A taster for many other wonderful authors!

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Not only is the writing exquisite but the storytelling is mercurial and embodies all the different voices beautifully.

Masterful

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Where does Landmarks rank among all the audiobooks you’ve listened to so far?

I love Robert MacFarlane's books. His ideas about landscape and our relationship to it are endlessly stimulating. For me, because this is not a narrative as such, I sometimes had to rewind to pick up the thread of the thoughts.

Any additional comments?

The glossary of words for landscape features, beautifully read, is poetry and made me want to buy the physical book so I could browse at my own pace but the physical book is printed on such nasty paper I didn't.

This book is a poem

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