Migrations
A fortnight ago, as Twitter descended into chaos under Elon Musk's ownership we hatched a plan to feather a nest for our non-twittering friends, old and new.
Hello dear friends,
Welcome to our new fortnightly newsletter, in which we’ll be noticing nature as well as keeping you abreast of news about our forthcoming book Nature's Calendar (scheduled for release with Granta in September 2023). We’ll also be sharing opportunities to access workshops and other events that we’re running, or contributing to in the near future.
In this first newsletter I’ll be giving you a brief overview of who we are and what we do.
We are a four womxn team, who write collectively under the name Noticing Nature (our twitter handle is @Naturalcalendar).
We aim to move beyond the male-dominated tradition of nature writing. That is to say, away from imagining landscapes as something to be conquered: we’re not about ‘ticking’ species off a list, or about chasing rarities either. Our work is a celebration of quotidian nature: of the everyday, common species that are often overlooked, but that are deeply loved.
We try to escape cliche and ‘enchant’ these by our interdisciplinary approach, which brings together different kinds of knowledge in what we hope are surprising new ways.
Individually we are:
Kiera Chapman, a Sheffield based academic and freelance editor.
Rebecca Warren, a historian living in Kent.
Lulah Ellender, a Brighton based writer and book coach and author of Elisabeth’s Lists (Granta 2018); Grounding (Granta 2022).
Rowan Jaines, a lecturer in Human Environmental Geography at The University of Sheffield.
Our project began..
…in the early days of the first Covid-19 lock down. It was one of those chance occurrences that happen on social media between strangers. It started out casually, with a random Twitter exchange.
Lulah posted a segment from a Japanese calendar that divided the year into five-day ‘microseasons’, each of which had its own beautiful name. A few of us began a conversation motivated by a combined fascination with the natural world and profound alarm at the impact of insensitive human interference and climate breakdown on nature.
This led to a desire to capture the fleeting nature of seasonal change though close observation. To articulate this, we drew on the idea of the traditional Japanese micro-season calendar and started to wonder what a British version might look like.
We decided to open it out to the entire Twitter community, asking people what they had noticed over the past five days, and then running a poll to decide a ‘winning’ nomination. We wrote threads about each of the winners, in which we tried to surprise and delight our audience by bringing together science, social science, and arts and humanities in new combinations.
The initial appeal of the microseason idea was that it felt like a good way to get through the global pandemic and its fallout - taking life in small, manageable chunks. As many people found solace in their gardens and open spaces we also wanted to develop our practice of noticing and gratitude for the natural world around us. As the Twitter project developed we realised many people were finding joy in discovering more about the animals, plants and weather patterns that crossed their paths.
The idea of what eventually became our book began to take form through the act of experimentation and conversation. We felt a book could harness this attentiveness and bring the same sense of awe and respite to our readers. We kept as close as possible to the names we had gathered, dividing the year into 72 short seasons that each record the progression of seasonal change in the natural world at that particular moment.
The act of noticing nature in these tiny beats of the passing year – particularly during the first dreamlike year of the pandemic – felt radically grounding. It reminded us of the French novelist Georges Perec’s admonition that one should ‘Question your teaspoons’. It was an opportunity to turn away from the large-scale narratives blasted out from headlines and speakers, and to work with others to reorient our gaze towards the granular truths of small, everyday realities.
We all have found ourselves repeatedly delighted by the project’s experimental and playful form. Something about the way that we approached the work, right from the start, seemed to be an opportunity to question the habitual; to make, break and remold form. We hope that this newsletter might invite a new group of people to engage with our project, in doing so changing its boundaries and horizons.
Lulah still has a few spaces on her upcoming online course:
‘BRINGING YOUR WRITING TO LIFE’
In this six week online course, Lulah will help you to get started with a life writing or narrative non-fiction project. Using a range of texts, writing tasks and extended written pieces you’ll be guided through different ways to bring your life writing off the page and write a compelling narrative.
You’ll finish the course with a clear way forward for your work, writing tools you’ll use forever and hopefully some lasting friendships and ongoing support.
There are two options for this course. One runs from 3rd February-10th March 2023 with sessions every Friday at 10am GMT. The other runs from 2nd February to 9th March with sessions every Thursday evening at 6.30pm GMT. Please specify which option you’d like when signing up. Sessions will be recorded so you can catch up if you can’t make it.
6 x 2.5-hour workshops on: memory and imagination; objects and place; viewpoints (whose story are you telling?); researching; writing others (what are the ethical and practical considerations?); bringing it all together
Written feedback on a >3000 word piece of writing at the end of the course
Exclusive Facebook group
First chance to book on retreats at my cottage in France
£300