Modern Nature cover art

Modern Nature

Journals, 1989 - 1990

 Preview
Get this deal Try Premium Plus free
Offer ends December 16, 2025 11:59pm GMT.
Prime members: New to Audible? Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Just £0.99/mo for your first 3 months of Audible.
1 bestseller or new release per month—yours to keep.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, podcasts, and Originals.
Auto-renews at £8.99/mo after 3 months. Cancel monthly.
Pick 1 audiobook a month from our unmatched collection - including bestsellers and new releases.
Listen all you want to thousands of included audiobooks, Originals, celeb exclusives, and podcasts.
Access exclusive sales and deals.
£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically.

Modern Nature

By: Derek Jarman
Narrated by: Julian Sands
Get this deal Try Premium Plus free

£8.99/mo after 3 months. Cancel monthly. Offer ends December 16, 2025 11:59pm GMT.

£8.99/month after 30 days. Renews automatically. See here for eligibility.

Buy Now for £15.99

Buy Now for £15.99

Only £0.99 a month for the first 3 months. Pay £0.99 for the first 3 months, and £8.99/month thereafter. Renews automatically. Terms apply. Start my membership

About this listen

A meditative and inspiring diary of Derek Jarman's famous garden at Dungeness.

In 1986 Derek Jarman discovered he was HIV positive and decided to make a garden at his cottage on the barren coast of Dungeness.

Facing an uncertain future, he nevertheless found solace in nature, growing all manner of plants. While some perished beneath wind and sea-spray, others flourished, creating brilliant, unexpected beauty in the wilderness.

Modern Nature is both a diary of the garden and a meditation by Jarman on his own life: his childhood, his time as a young gay man in the 1960s, his renowned career as an artist, writer and film-maker. It is at once a lament for a lost generation, an unabashed celebration of gay sexuality and a devotion to all that is living.

©1991 Derek Jarman/The Keith Collins Will (P)2021 Audible, Ltd Diaries & Journals Entertainment & Celebrities Entertainment & Performing Arts Letters & Correspondence Memoirs, Diaries & Correspondence Celebrity Entertainment Inspiring

Listeners also enjoyed...

 A Funny Thing Happened on the Way cover art
The Thought-Fox and Other Poems cover art
Summer Snow cover art
Francis Bacon in Your Blood cover art
Negative Capability: A Diary of Surviving cover art
Letters to a Young Poet cover art
The Lives of Lucian Freud cover art
Diary of a Lone Twin cover art
The Penelopiad cover art
The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath cover art
Next to Nature cover art
Avoiding Anxiety in Autistic Adults cover art

The Pride List of Queer Storytelling

To mark Pride 2023 Audible teamed up with non-profit organisation, Out on the Page, supporter and champion of LGBTQIA+ writers and writing, to release an extensive Pride List of Queer Storytelling. Featuring contributions from some of the UK’s most important and exciting voices from the LGBTQIA+ community, this audiobook is one of the many featured on the list that is available to listen to on Audible.
Explore the list
All stars
Most relevant
I was really surprised by how absorbed I became in this beautifully written book. Poignant compelling and unmissable.

Compelling narration bringing Jarman’s world to life by the late Julian Sands.

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I am listening to Modern Nature on repeat it is my diazepam. An optimist through everything that was thrown at him. A tragedy that we lost him so young. Julian Sands reading is perfect.

Humanity

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Sensitive thoughtful and wonderful writing. But the narration does not feel as human or flexible as the writing. It is a bit abrasive and with a hard tone, which means the meditative and reflective nature of Jarman’s diary is not able to be relaxed into.

Beautiful diary but not great narration

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
If you are at all interested in art, London, alternative viewpoints ( and gardening ) you will love this.

Bittersweet, fascinating .

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
This takes you onto the shingle of Dungeness to shelter among the vegetation (both native and introduced)and to cushion against the double tragedy of life under homophobia and death by HIV before successful treatment options became available. Yes, the narrator jars initially, but his abruptness of tone soon moulds the ear to the blunt realities of a difficult and fascinating life well lived.

Garden escapism

Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
See more reviews