belonging
"Snags come in all shapes and sizes, backless and pale amongst the deep greens of the living trees, pockmarked, riddled with the traces of beetles and beasties. Over time they will fracture their branches, sometimes shear half their trunks onto the forest floor. These trees can stand for decades, decaying quietly slowly, and leaching a gradual and steady release of nutrients back into the forest's understory... I wonder how the dead, the things that are no longer with us, continue not just to influence but give succour to the present"
Some of the original versions of the work I refer to in belonging can be found here:
dead amongst the living
walkDrawings
“A beautifully written meditation on rural surroundings and her place within them” Sunday Times
“Amanda Thomson’s new book manages to carve out a distinctive niche for itself … This is a passionate book and infused with a sense of rootedness” STUART KELLY, The Scotsman
“Thomson writes of the natural in a way I have yet to encounter before. There is no real hoo-haa, no flowery description of which to speak yet somehow, I came away with that ache inside me — that renewed obsession with the world that is only borne of a very particular kind of writing — poetic, loving, raw … Like no other”
KERRI NÍ DOCHARTAIGH, Caught By The River
“A thoughtful and intricate meditation on many things: Scotland’s settlements and how those intertwine with the country’s natural landscape, the connections and disconnections between family and home, and the fine line between what is nature and what is art … A pleasure to read” The Skinny
‘Beautiful without ever being pretentious, Amanda Thomson’s Belonging pays loving homage to Scottish nature and history … Meticulously curated and thoughtfully researched, the book creates vivid impressions of this country. There is something undeniably powerful about her invitation, in a time when people are increasingly obsessed with how we present ourselves online, to look up at the world around us, and to invest conscious thought in the people and places that give life meaning as well as context. As nature writing, Belonging is glorious.’ – The List