Is a River Alive? (Hardcover)

“Robert Macfarlane is a once-in-a-generation virtuoso, and I don’t know when his kaleidoscopic language and world-expanding scholarship have been used to more potent effect than in this impassioned, resounding affirmative to the title’s urgent question.” —JOHN VAILLANT, author of Fire Weather

“Is a River Alive? is itself a river of poetic prose…. 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, author of Orwell’s Roses

“Is a River Alive? is a breathtaking work that speaks powerfully to this moment of crisis and transformation.” —MERLIN SHELDRAKE, author of Entangled Life

“Is a River Alive? is one of the best books I’ve read in a very long time—exciting, brilliantly comprehensive, mind-altering. In one of its many stunning moments, Macfarlane describes the myriad rivers trapped and buried under the concrete of our cities. ‘Daylighting’ occurs on those rare occasions when these ghost-rivers are dug out & released to the surface to feel the sun, to expand—majestic creatures—and spread life once again. To read this book is to feel your ghosted soul undergo such ‘daylighting’—metaphysical, political, emotional, linguistic. Any soul going dormant, any citizen going numb, will be revivified and propelled back to their essential core, where rage, wonder, and imagination intertwine, and a powerful hope for the earth arises. A spellbinding, life-changing work.” —JORIE GRAHAM, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet

“Is a River Alive? is a beautifully written, poetic testament to the vitality of the Earth and the forms of politics that can be based upon that premise.” —AMITAV GHOSH, author of Sea of Poppies

“Like its subject, Is a River Alive? is a work of flow and counter-flow. It is lyrical, evocative, closely observed and deeply moving. Robert Macfarlane offers new ways to think and, just as importantly, feel about the majestic and mysterious non-human world.” —ELIZABETH KOLBERT, author of The Sixth Extinction

“[A] lyrical hybrid narrative of travel, history, and environmentalism.” ―The New York Times

“[A] meld of real-world urgency and an enchanting sort of magical realism.” ―The Bookseller

“[Macfarlane’s] prose aspires to poetry.” ―The Guardian

“The Book is a delight. The writing on nature is so stirring, so surprising, so acute. And lavish: you could gorge yourself on [Macfarlane’s] metaphors and similes…. The storytelling…is gripping…. A masterclass in how to write about travel, fear and, well, yourself.” ―The Times

“[Macfarlane] shows a sharper critical edge than in his earlier work but also engages more personally and emotionally with his material. Wrecked or restored relationships between humans and the natural world prompt the writer, like a contemporary William Blake, to throw down a moral gauntlet to those who hold economic and political power…. [Is a River Alive?] provides timely and necessary inspiration.” ―The Conversation

“Forceful, thoughtful and beautiful.” ―The Economist

ROBERT MACFARLANE is internationally renowned for his writing on nature, people and place. His bestselling books include Underland, Landmarks, The Old Ways, The Wild Places and Mountains of the Mind, as well as the book-length prose-poem, Ness. His work has been translated into more than thirty languages, won many prizes around the world and been widely adapted for film, music, theatre, radio and dance. He has also written operas, plays, and films including River and Mountain, both narrated by Willem Dafoe. He has collaborated closely with artists including Olafur Eliasson and Stanley Donwood, and with the artist Jackie Morris he co-created the internationally bestselling books of nature-poetry and art, The Lost Words and The Lost Spells. As a lyricist and performer, he has written albums and songs with musicians including Cosmo Sheldrake, Julie Fowlis and Johnny Flynn, with whom he has released two albums, Lost In The Cedar Wood and The Moon Also Rises. In 2017, the American Academy of Arts and Letters awarded him the E.M. Forster Prize for Literature, and in 2023 in Toronto he was the inaugural winner of the Weston International Award for a body of work in the field of nonfiction. He is a Fellow of Emmanuel College, Cambridge.