Is a River Alive?

Robert Macfarlane (University of Cambridge)

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Hardback

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English

WW Norton & Co
20 May 2025

Philosophy; Mathematics & Sciences; Applied ecology; Conservation of the environment; The Earth: natural history general

Hailed in the New York Times as ""a naturalist who can unfurl a sentence with the breathless ease of a master angler,"" Robert Macfarlane brings his glittering style to a profound work of travel writing, reportage, and natural history. Is a River Alive? is a joyful, mind-expanding exploration of an ancient, urgent idea: that rivers are living beings who should be recognized as such in imagination and law.

Macfarlane takes readers on three unforgettable journeys teeming with extraordinary people, stories, and places: to the miraculous cloud-forests and mountain streams of Ecuador, to the wounded creeks and lagoons of India, and to the spectacular wild rivers of Canada--imperiled respectively by mining, pollution, and dams. Braiding these journeys is the life story of the fragile chalk stream a mile from Macfarlane's house, a stream who flows through his own years and days.

Powered by dazzling prose and lit throughout by other minds and voices, Is a River Alive? will open hearts, challenge perspectives, and remind us that our fate flows with that of rivers--and always has.

By: Robert Macfarlane (University of Cambridge)
Imprint: WW Norton & Co
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 239mm, Width: 160mm, Spine: 30mm
Weight: 645g
ISBN: 9780393242133
ISBN 10: 0393242137
Pages: 384
Publication Date: 20 May 2025
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Robert Macfarlane’s best-selling, prize-winning books include Underland, Mountains of the Mind, The Old Ways, Landmarks, and, with Jackie Morris, The Lost Words and The Lost Spells. He lives in Cambridge, England, where he is a fellow of the University of Cambridge.

Reviews for Is a River Alive?

""This book is itself a river of poetic prose, an invitation to get onboard and float through the rapids of encounters with places and people, the eddies of ideas, to navigate the resurgence of Indigenous worldviews through three extraordinary journeys recounted with a vividness that lifts readers out of themselves and into these waterscapes. Read it for pleasure, read it for illumination, read it for confirmation that our world is changing in wonderful as well as terrible ways."" -- Rebecca Solnit