Nature Book Reader June 2020 - Flipbook - Page 140
A Nature Book Reader
KEN WORPOLE
One of Britain’s leading writers on architecture, landscape and public policy issues
The White Peacock by D.H. Lawrence
The setting which provides
the scenery for Lawrence’s
first novel, The White Peacock,
is a small patch of terrain
connecting Eastwood – with
ten collieries then – with
the surrounding farmland.
Lawrence loved this stretch of
Nottinghamshire countryside,
and knew the names of
every bird and flower to
be seen there.
It is for the redemptive
qualities of flowers, both
wild and cultivated, that
Lawrence reserved his
most exquisite writing:
‘The earth was red and
warm, pricked with the dark,
succulent green of bluebell
sheaths, and embroidered with
grey-green clusters of spears,
and many white flowerets.
High above, above the light
tracery of hazel, the weird oaks
tangled in the sunset. Below,
in the first shadows, drooped
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hosts of little white flowers,
so silent and sad; it seemed
like a holy communion of pure
wild things, numberless, frail,
and folded meekly in
the evening light.’
What Lawrence captures
most perfectly for me is a
sense of place combining
the industrial and the
agricultural. Wherever the
characters wander in the
lanes and fields, they are
within hearing of shunting
yards and coal trains. In The
White Peacock Lawrence
explored how a small patch
of landscape could sustain
a lifetime’s attachments
and memories.
Further Reading
Briggflatts by Basil Bunting
Dart by Alice Oswald
